The Lady Is a Tramp
by WillyWiluhps
Summary: you've heard it about a million times before
1. Nasty! Nasty!

**01 Nasty! Nasty!**

Delilah lay in bed, trying to remember a dream. Her dress had been ripping on a deserted island, but she had ignored it and gone off looking for Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom...and then what...already it was becoming blurry at the edges...

She was about to fall back asleep on the rock-hard pokémon center bed when a gigantic crash and a sudden brightness startled her so much she gasped out loud.

"Oops!" giggled her roommate Gabrielle Varnham, who had opened the curtains and knocked their Pokégears off the table where they had been charging. "Sorry!"

"That's okay," Delilah mumbled, unsure if her words could be distinguished considering her current mental condition.

"Check out time is eleven o'clock, by the way," said Gabrielle. "Maybe it's time to move on, anyway! It's almost nine."

Delilah groaned and rubbed her face. She had planned to leave Azalea today, and head for Goldenrod, now that she had won a Hive Badge. At this moment, however, it sounded quite appealing to stay in bed—so what if she missed check out time, and ended up staying in Azalea another day...?

But then, she realized, there was plenty of reason not to stay in Azalea. After all, why was she so tired? Yes, she had had a soda last night in the Azalea Gym gift shop with the hyperactive ten-year-old prodigy gym leader, and, yes, she and Gabrielle had watched a History Channel special until three in the morning after spending too long at the grocery store, which was all quite good fun, so how could this pokémon journey dealie be any better...?

Well, maybe it could be better if anyone in the building ever stopped talking through the walls which were about as thick as a bookmark, or if the woman outside would stop screaming bloody murder which was clearly and audibly happening around her, or if the refrigerator didn't have to BOINK loudly and then buzz for several minutes at regular intervals, or if the bed had a mattress instead of what seemed to be stacked panels of drywall that creaked with every blink, BUT WHO'S COMPLAINING!

Really, though, she thought as she brushed her teeth, it wasn't so bad. After all, she had a cute little beanbag shaped like a politoed with beads for eyes from the Azalea Gym gift shop.

Oh yeah, and a Hive Badge.

"It was really a great battle, you and Bugsy," said Gabrielle in the cafeteria, eating banana pancakes that radiated waves of banana for miles around and made Delilah's breakfast taste like bananas.

"Oh," said Delilah. "Thanks." Since she didn't think it was very interesting, she attempted to alter the course of conversation: "Did you see those two babies when we went into the gym...?"

"No, I don't think I did..."

"They were both totally bald, with ears practically as big as their heads, and their faces...!"

She tried to imitate their faces, making Gabrielle laugh.

"Naturally," Delilah concluded, "they burst into tears at the sight of each other."

Gabrielle laughed again. "I'll never understand people taking their children to pokémon gyms with them," she said, shaking her head. "It's as bad as taking them to the movies..."

The truth was that Delilah didn't think pokémon battling was a very interesting conversation topic, indeed she found it quite boring if she wasn't battling herself. Gabrielle was collecting badges, too. They had been sharing their room in the pokémon center for a couple of weeks while their time training at the Azalea Gym overlapped.

Gabrielle told Delilah about a deep and interesting dream she had had about a wailord and then they said goodbye. En route to the trolley station Delilah passed the shop of Kurt Ferguson, the semi-famous poké ball craftsman. In order to turn out optimal revenue, the shop was of course placed in close proximity to the pokémon center and the Azalea Gym. Delilah had only caught one pokémon on her own, a sentret she named Snoops, and it was a rather irritating experience that she didn't really think she would ever want to repeat, but she decided to have a look in the shop anyway, because there was such a fuss about it and maybe Kurt Ferguson's poké balls were wonderful enough to make her change her mind.

So she stepped into the shop, after moving her politoed beanbag, letting it stick its head out of her purse a little so it could have some air. Kurt Ferguson's poké balls were very pretty, but also quite expensive, considering Delilah thought she would probably never actually use them. Unfortunately, besides Kurt Ferguson behind the counter and the little girl on the floor with a Barbie doll, Delilah was the only person in the store. It would be extremely awkward for her to leave without making a purchase.

She was preparing herself for a showdown between frugality and social discomfort when Kurt Ferguson asked her who she was. She told him her name and he said, "You want to buy some balls? Sorry, but that'll have to wait; we're closing a bit early today."

"Oh, okay," said Delilah.

"Do you know Team Rocket?" he asked, and then waved his hand dismissively. "Ah, don't worry. I'll tell you anyhow. Team Rocket's an evil gang that uses pokémon for their dirty work. They're supposed to have disbanded three years ago," he harrumphed as he changed the sign from "open" to "closed". "Anyway, they're at the well, cutting off slowpokes' tails for sale!"

He left quite abruptly, muttering to himself.

This explained a number of things. In addition to women with ugly babies in strollers, the Azalea Gym had been patronized over the weeks by an increasing number of strangely attractive European men with wandering gazes; Delilah and Gabrielle Varnham had continued to see this type of man around town, at the pokémon center or in shops, occasionally in a uniform with a high neck and shoulder pads and the letter R on the front. Because Team Rocket was supposed to have been broken up, they had assumed it was some kind of publicity stunt or something.

Once the two of them had gone together to the Slowpoke Well, a research reserve home to lots of endangered plants and wildlife, including its introduced population of slowpokes, and there had been a small altercation involving one of these men.

"Nothing is going on," he'd told them when Gabrielle asked. "It's unsafe to go in there, so I'm standing guard to make sure people don't wander in. Am I not a good Samaritan?"

He had been giving them a weird look, so they had left after that.

Team Rocket was a criminal organization, but beyond that Delilah didn't know much about it. What she knew even less about, however, was how to deal with being left with a stranger's young child. She wasn't sure if Kurt Ferguson was being horribly presumptuous leaving her there with his granddaughter Maisy or if he was maybe forgetful in old age—but if that were the case, why would he be left to watch her in the first place?

The sun was beginning its descent before Delilah was ready to assume any real responsibility.

She sighed as she closed the Velcro on a Barbie dress. Maisy was making her two favorite Barbies, Jacklyn and Christina, converse in poetry. But Maisy was eight, so her poetry was not very good.

"Jacklyn, your hair is awful. Um...it looks like a waffle," said Christina.

"I know," Jacklyn replied, bobbing up and down dramatically. "I get so mad when she makes my hair bad. I got so mad at her today that I fired her! Um...I don't know why I ever hired her."

"Hey, Maisy," said Delilah. "Um...do you know where your granddad is?"

"Yes, he's at Slowpoke Well," she said. "Team Rocket gets...gets...at the well."

So apparently this was a thing for Kurt. It had been a while and Delilah was getting uncomfortable. She wasn't sure what to do; should she go to the police? But Maisy was acting like this was pretty normal...should she just leave?

Maisy abandoned her dolls to pet Toast, Delilah's quilava, who had been lying on the ground with her head in Delilah's lap.

"So, um, does he do this kind of thing, like, a lot?"

Maisy shrugged uninterestedly and then laughed shrilly when Toast grabbed her hand with her front paws.

Delilah exhaled in boredom and frustration. Maybe she should just leave.

"Do you like cupcakes?" Maisy asked suddenly, and then added, "For goodness sakes?"

"Sure," said Delilah.

"Let's go across the street to get cupcakes," said Maisy. "But not Corn Flakes."

Across the street was a bakery. Maisy continued making primitive rhymes and Delilah, bitter at having spent four dollars for a cupcake that she only licked the frosting off of, wondered why her eight-year-old attention span hadn't already lost the fight with this form of "entertainment".

Delilah frequently found it helpful to look at her life as if it were an episode of an offbeat, irreverent sitcom, ostensibly allowing her to foresee the possibilities of impractical and uncomfortable situations. This did not, however, abate her frustrations when Maisy revealed to her that her mother was at home, in the back of the shop. Of course, that would just be typical. Whenever Delilah decided to be responsible, it was always the wrong decision. Delilah's decisions were always wrong it seemed.

"Well, she's going to think I abducted you," said Delilah. "Let's go back."

"Wait, there's a stitch in my side," said Maisy, stopping on the sidewalk. "I have not lied."

Delilah stopped and Maisy bent down to stretch. It wasn't that Delilah didn't like children, which she didn't, but she wasn't sure why they were so popular. She thought they were just sort of loud and needy and overrated.

"Bad things could happen to a person on a dark, deserted street like this." A long shadow stepped into the light of a streetlamp. "And at this time of night, there'd be no one around to see it."

"You know, bad things also happen to people who sneak up on people in the dark. What are you doing?"

"Lurking. What are you doing?"

"Just trying to make it to tomorrow without being assaulted on the street..."

Adam ignored her and watched Maisy rub her side under her ribcage. "What's that?" he asked. "Your sister?"

"She's my illegitimate child," said Delilah.

He made no reaction.

Being outside of her hometown, Cianwood, was occasionally a little shocking. There were so many kinds of people Delilah had never encountered before, like people who used the word "irregardless" unironically, or "poor people". (Cianwood wasn't _the_ snobbiest community in Johto, but there was something to be said about a town where any homeless found by the police were escorted across the bridge to downtown Goldenrod.)

Judging by his tight vocabulary and his tighter Jean Paul Gaultier jeans, Adam didn't seem to be either of these, but nevertheless he was rather puzzling to Delilah. She had always allowed herself to think she was sort of funny, and her friends told her she was funny, but Adam called that to question with his total unwillingness to laugh at her jokes. She thought at first that it was perhaps because he was British and so something was lost in "translation", but then she found out he was just a jerk. He wasn't quite so bad at the very first, but as soon as she beat him at pokémon he had shown his true colors (black, mostly).

Maisy squealed deafeningly as Toast attacked her ankles.

"Be careful," warned Delilah, who didn't want to be sued. "Don't get her too excited." She liked to think that she trained her pokémon well enough that they could generally be trusted around other people, but nothing was ever certain, especially with kids.

"She won't burn me," Maisy insisted. "She won't turn me...on fire."

"I hope you're right," Delilah said half-truthfully.

"What are you doing?" Adam asked her. There was a note of slightly cynical boredom in Adam's voice, something a bit jaded, blasé.

"Nothing, really," she said, hoping she wouldn't have to reveal the amazingly incompetent details of the stupid day she had been having. "I'm taking Maisy back to her mother, at Kurt Ferguson's ball shop."

"Kurt Ferguson?" he said, looking at the shop across the street. "Maybe I'll come with you."

"Well, if you must, but Kurt's not there."

"What, is he the only one that works there?"

"Oh. Maybe not..."

It was closed, but Adam looked at poké balls anyway while Delilah found Maisy's mother, who of course didn't even know that she had been missing, and wove her tale of woe and ineptitude, to the mother's more-or-less ambivalence: "You didn't have to hang around, sweetie," she said. "I was here the whole time."

"Yeah...but I didn't _know that_," said Delilah, unsure how this point had been missed by her. "Nobody _told me_ that. I thought she was by herself..."

After a while she gave up and left. Outside of the shop she bent down and scratched behind Toast's ears. She then went to pat her toy politoed to reassure it that it would be okay, but it wasn't okay. It was gone. She glanced in front of her and behind her and in various other different directions, but, considering all of the places where it could have gone missing, odds were quite slim that it would be there in her current vicinity, and it wasn't. She was a little bit disgruntled since she had not even had it for a full day, not even taking into account the fact that any purchase from a gym gift shop was almost certainly terrifically overpriced.

"So will you be going to Slowpoke Well?" Adam asked her.

"Why?"

"Because of Kurt Ferguson, and Team Rocket."

She shrugged. "It's none of my business..."

He looked at her weirdly. "You're not even interested?"

She scoffed with derisive confusion, or something. "I'm sure it's 'interesting'," she said, "but why would I go to Slowpoke Well with Kurt Ferguson and Team Rocket? What would I be doing there? If anything, I would call the police, but it's not like I have any good reason to anyway."

Adam was extremely intimidating. He was tall and good-looking and he had a leather jacket with three spikes on each epaulet. He kept looking at her, and it made her nervous. "Would you go, if I told you what to do?"

"What?"

"If I told you what to do," he repeated.

Theoretically she knew what these words meant but she had no idea what he was asking her. She stared at him, waiting for him to elaborate, and he stared at her, waiting for her to reply.

Apparently he had less patience than she did because after a while he turned and said, "Come on."

Adam seemed to know something that she didn't, so she went with him out of curiosity, recalling Toast to her poké ball.

As they got into his car he asked her, "Are you here for Azalea's badge?"

"Yeah, I got it yesterday."

"Are you collecting badges, so you can enter the championship tournament?"

She shrugged. "I don't know, maybe," she said. She didn't really want to very much and didn't think she probably would.

"So, what, then, are you trying to find yourself?"

She smirked. "I would hope I could look for something a bit more worthwhile," she said.

"Hm," he said, frowning, because laughing was beneath him.

So she didn't bother again for a while. Adam, who carried himself like a Trina music video, was startlingly handsome, with very striking pigmentation; he might have had a sort of Leyendecker dreamboat quality if not for his monolithic attitude problem. She asked him if he was part of a slowpoke rights activism group or something like that.

"No," he said. "I just hate Team Rocket."

"Oh, good! I feel better, knowing you're not doing this out of the kindness of your heart."

"Humph," he said.

"What do I have to do with this, anyway? I assume you're not keeping me around for my pleasant company."

"I could use you," he said. "You and your pokémon."

"'Use' me? For what?"

"What the fuck!" he said suddenly, honking the horn at a couple of boys on bicycles. The car swerved exaggeratedly and Delilah grabbed the handle growing out of the ceiling. "Why are you riding bikes at night!" Adam asked rhetorically.

Adam wasn't a bad driver, exactly; in fact, Delilah had to assume he was very, very good at it because otherwise they would surely have been killed already. When they got to Slowpoke Well it was quite dark and she asked him what exactly they were even doing because she still wasn't really sure.

"We're just going to mess it up a little," he said.

"What do you mean?" she said. "Why not just call the police, and let them do it? And anyway, what is Team Rocket even doing? I thought they were broken up? I mean, what are we messing up, exactly? What are they doing?"

"Look, Delilah." He turned his penetrating gaze on her; there was a hypnotic intensity in it, and she looked away. "You don't _have_ to do this. But you came, didn't you?"

There were men collecting slowpokes in poké balls, which Adam said he would empty and replace. He pointed out one of the strangely attractive men, who was wearing a different style of uniform, and told her to engage him in a pokémon battle because "it would be embarrassing" when he lost. She thought this was rather petty, but maybe there was something she was missing that he hadn't explained to her; maybe there was a good reason for it. However she still felt very awkward about it.

Luckily she didn't have to approach him, because he saw her and did so first. "What do we have here?" he said, his hands on his hips.

"Um?" she said.

He looked at her, apparently awaiting an explanation.

"Just...exploring Slowpoke Well," she said, and gestured to the vague gang activity around her. In spite of Adam's rather conspicuous appearance nobody seemed to be fazed by it, so she wasn't sure why she was singled out. "What's going on?"

His face darkened slightly and he leaned closer to her. "I am often labeled," he said, "as the scariest and cruelest guy in Team Rocket..."

"Okay," she said.

"I strongly urge you not to interfere with our business," he said.

"Okay," she said. Maybe she would have been scared if the entire experience was not so surreal.

He released a zubat. Apparently this was a threat; perhaps he would order it to attack her. So she released Toast, and they battled.

It struck her suddenly as rather presumptuous of Adam to assume that she would win a match, because what would happen if she lost? Would he have his pokémon attack her or something, or threaten to do so, to chase her off?

She won anyway.

And it did embarrass him.

"I didn't see it coming," he said through gritted teeth.

"Um...if you don't mind my asking," she said, and pointed to the red R on his chest.

"Humph," he said, looking at it. "Team Rocket was indeed broken up three years ago. But we continued our activities underground."

"Oh."

Suddenly he grabbed her arm and began to drag her away. Naturally she was curious to know where she was being taken, but didn't ask, because she figured she would find out eventually.

It was an exit.

"A small obstacle like you won't be much of a problem for our mission," he said, pushing her out. "I advise you to be very afraid of what is to come." He stared intensely at her, daring her to defy him perhaps, but she didn't, and he turned and went back down the stairs.

"Whatever," she said, and turned around.

She wasn't sure where she was; he had not taken her to the main entrance/exit. There was a street, but she didn't know what street it was. She started to skirt the edges of the reserve when Adam found her again, and led her back to his car in the parking lot.

"Or maybe," he said, in the middle of abusing Team Rocket, "they try to tell you it's a 'social club'—yes, of course! Wide-shouldered black uniforms, with the 'club' insignia on the front. Yes, a club, a society, just like the Crips. Of course, it's suspicious, and the police tries to keep an eye on them, but it's all about this phony image, you know, pretending to be anything other than organised crime. Public relations, you know."

"Gee, no, mine are all private."

He frowned in acknowledgement of her joke. At least he understood her jokes, even if he didn't appreciate them.

"Where are we going?" she asked, realizing they were on the interstate.

"I have to lose this car," he said.

"Did you steal it?"

"No."

"Is it yours?"

"No."

"Okay, whatever."

She was sure there was a good reason for this, but she doubted he would tell her so she stopped asking. He went off the road at some point and when they stopped they were in what seemed to be a forest, which was strange, because Johto was mostly chaparral.

He turned off the engine and got out of the car, so she did too. He started looking around them for something.

She leaned into the car for her purse. Naturally this cued the ocean breeze which blew in and lifted her skirts up. It seemed like such a clichéd, contrived situation that she was skeptical of its actuality.

"...Did that really just happen."

She was hoping Adam would say "huh?" or "what?" or something along those lines. "Nobody saw anything," he assured her instead.

She was sort of embarrassed. She wasn't sure if this was because she could have just as easily worn pants or because she could have just as easily worn prettier underwear, but she thought it was probably the latter.

He stopped his searching and looked at her. "You beat him, didn't you?"

"Yeah," she said. "That's what you wanted, isn't it?"

In that moment, she wasn't sure if that really was what he had wanted.

"I mean, I did win," she said, "but don't you think it's kind of, like, I don't know, foolhardy, to assume that I would."

"You beat me before," he said, taking a poké ball off his belt and expanding it. "Let's see how good you are."

She thought this was a bit unfair. Their last match had been one-on-one, and he had had a type advantage, which was not strictly fair either. This time, it was three-on-three, which was more balanced, but she had just come from a match, so her pokémon were not at their full energy.

She won anyway.

She could tell he was pretty mad, but he seemed to be trying not to show it.

"You only won because my pokémon were weak," he said.

She shrugged, choosing not to remind him that she was the one whose pokémon had just come from battle.

"That goes for Team Rocket, too," he said. "They think they are big and tough as long as they are in a group. But get them alone, and they're weak."

"So, what?" she said. "You think Team Rocket's cowardly?"

"Oh, a gang isn't a coward," he said. "A gang is a strong, courageous unit, _composed_ of cowards, too scared to do it alone."

She shrugged in impartial acknowledgement of this philosophy.

"I have no tolerance for weakness," he said, running his hand through his hair. Adam had Princess Ariel hair, long and lush and very red.

"And I suppose there's no weakness in male dandyism?"

He looked at her. His face was obscured by shadows, so she couldn't gauge his reaction; she figured it was probably his usual mixture of aloof hostility and sophisticated contempt, so she made a face of mingled amusement and apathy and hoped it was appropriate.

Suddenly he turned and continued into the dark. Delilah followed, still with no idea where they were.

She saw something move.

"Oh—my—GOD!"

Adam whipped around. "What?"

"A bug!"

"We're in a forest, Delilah! There will be bugs!"

"Oh, no...oh my God...I think that was an ariados...oh my Goddddd...I think it was...you don't think we'll have to sleep here, do you?"

"I won't," he said, looking around at the trees. Then, with a triumphant ah!, he waded past some bushes and re-emerged with a beautiful black street bike.

"Oh, wow!" she said as he put a leg over it. "Where did that come from?"

He pulled on a pair of bright yellow gloves as the motorcycle idled. "I got drunk and forgot it here."

"Oh. Well..." He put on his helmet. "Could...I have a ride?"

"No, I don't think so," he said.


	2. Ha Ha Ha

**02 Ha Ha Ha**

Delilah had never really gotten used to getting up early in the morning to train at gyms, despite having done it almost every day for the past few months. She had the unfortunate tendency to stay up rather later than was probably logical even when she had had to get up very early that same morning.

So she didn't talk much in the mornings. Irwin could talk plenty, though, which was a relief to her heavy eyelids and scratchy throat as they walked from his parking spot to the gym. The Goldenrod Gym was the oldest gym in the country; Goldenrod was the county seat and largest city of Johto, the first place in the US where pokémon training gained any substantial popularity, back in the early twentieth century. Parking was always difficult around the Goldenrod Gym so when Irwin gave her a ride they usually ended up walking quite a distance anyway.

"...So they ended up not even going hiking, obviously," said Irwin, and laughed.

"Ah-hmm," she said in a rather pathetic attempt at laughter. She wasn't sure if he even heard her, since she was so tired she didn't know if she was hearing herself at the correct volume. But she also wasn't sure if he was even listening.

"Oh, look, there's Whitney," he said, waving. "She's with Art Christiansen..."

Whitney Delwyn, the gym leader, smiled brightly and waved at them as she crossed the street with Art Christiansen, who, like Delilah, was currently training at the Goldenrod Gym.

"Hi, guys! Good morning!" said Whitney as she and Art approached them. Whitney was a very bubbly sort of person and immediately launched into a recounting of her morning so far, which, while surely not having lasted more than a couple of hours, had been apparently extremely eventful, involving exciting occurrences such as getting dressed.

Whitney and Irwin quickly got caught up in their garrulous conversation, leaving Delilah walking next to Art. She would rather have been walking next to Whitney or Irwin, both of whom she found infinitely more interesting than Art, whose entire life seemed to revolve around running. All of his t-shirts seemed to be souvenirs from races he had participated in.

"How are you this morning?" he asked her.

"Fine," she said. "Tired."

"What time did you get up?"

She tried not to get annoyed, knowing that he was going to act all martyr-y and impressive and mock her for being tired when _he_ got up much earlier. "About eight," she said.

He laughed. "Don't I wish I could sleep in until eight!" he said predictably. "I got up to run in the sunrise, this morning at dawn."

"Well...you couldn't have picked a better time, I guess..."

Her sarcasm went over his head. She wasn't sure whether or not she was disappointed.

Their conversation as well as Irwin's and Whitney's tapered off as they passed a homeless woman lying on the ground under a blanket and screaming.

Once they were a safe distance away, Whitney turned around and made an awkward face, and all of them burst out laughing.

Delilah had a rather enjoyable day of training, despite horribly bruising her arm on the door. It was quite a hot October day, and after a few hours she sat outside with Whitney to enjoy a soda and a breeze.

"How old is your skitty?" asked Whitney professionally.

"He's two, two and a half," she said with a neutralizing hand gesture.

"He's very beautiful," said Whitney, reaching over to pet him. "He's got a great coat, very clean. What's his name?"

"Thank you. His name is Beau," said Delilah. "He takes good care of himself."

"I have to say, Delilah," said Whitney, "you're a credit to the Gym."

She wasn't sure what to say, so she kind of laughed. "Well, I try," she said.

"Irwin never used to come in to train," she said playfully.

"Haha...ugh," said Delilah, rolling her eyes, and Whitney laughed.

"So are you going to officially challenge me anytime soon?" asked Whitney. "I'm looking forward to battling you—how many badges have you got?"

"Two. I don't know, I guess I'll register for a match sometime. Do you know when your next vacancy is?"

"I don't know...I have a match this afternoon. In a couple weeks, I think," she said. "You should jump on it."

So with Whitney's encouragement, that day she registered for a badge match in two weeks' time. She and Irwin watched Whitney's match, which she won, and the three of them left the gym at the same time.

On their way they again passed the screaming homeless woman, who was now standing up and folding her blanket. As they walked by, she shrieked angrily and threw a shoe at Whitney.

Whitney and Delilah laughed in shock; Irwin swore, and made to cross the street. "Let's go this way," he said.

The woman yelled at them until they were out of sight.

"Oh, my God," said Irwin. "I mean, are you okay? Did you look at her or something?"

"No, I didn't look at her. It didn't hit me or anything, I'm fine."

"Gosh! I wonder if she's dangerous," said Irwin. "That's weird, we usually don't really see a lot of homeless people when we come this way, do we...?"

"Yeah, I saw another one this morning with Art," said Whitney as they came up to Irwin's car.

Irwin reached into his backpack and frowned. "Wait a minute," he said, taking off his backpack and looking in the pockets. "I can't...find my keys..."

"Oh," said Delilah.

"Really?" said Whitney.

"I know I had them," he said. "I swear, I put them in my backpack as we passed that lady...did I drop them somewhere...? Oh no...I'm sorry..."

"It's okay, man," said Delilah. "We'll just retrace your steps."

"I'll help you," said Whitney. "I don't have to be anywhere."

Irwin walked back along one side of the street, Delilah and Whitney on the other, but didn't find any sign of the keys.

"You know," said Whitney, "I just have this feeling that they're probably in his backpack..."

Delilah laughed. "Yeah, that would be typical," she said. "Like, if this were a sitcom, or a book? Totally. They would definitely be in the backpack."

"I don't know, I just have this weird feeling that that's where they are. I'm going to tell him to look again."

Irwin crossed the street, shrugging in distress to communicate that he had not found the keys. Whitney suggested that he check his backpack one more time; he sighed, took off the backpack, reached inside, made an exasperated face, and pulled out his keys.

Delilah laughed.

"Oh my God," he said, not laughing. "I can't even believe this."

"I knew it!" said Whitney.

"That's hilarious," said Delilah.

Irwin's face was very red. "Oh, God, I'm _so_ sorry," he said, putting his hand on her shoulder.

She smiled and tried not to be uncomfortable. "Don't worry about it," she said. "It's not a big deal, I don't have anything I have to do. Just another adventure on the path of life, and whatnot..."

"I knew it," said Whitney again. "I just had the funniest feeling..."

"I'm so sorry for the shittiness of this day," said Irwin. "Whitney gets attacked by a homeless woman, and now you have to put up with me being a dumbass..."

"Oh, come on," said Whitney. "You don't even know the kind of dumb things I do all the time."

"Yeah, and we didn't have to put up with you being a dumbass," said Delilah. "We _chose_ to."

He laughed vaguely, but his face was still red. Delilah realized that if her life were a book, she would have probably found this endearing, but instead it kind of embarrassed her secondhand.

She got back to the pokémon center around 4:30 to be told by her roommate Alana MacKenzie, who was just leaving, that the elevator was broken. Their room was on the fourth floor, and Irwin had told her it had reached 85° that day, so she had never before realized how many stairs there were. It was a very bright and clean room; she turned on the ceiling fan and collapsed on her floral bed for a minute before getting up to feed her pokémon.

After taking care of them she went out to get herself something to eat from a nearby café. She took her dinner up the four flights of stairs to her room and ended up reading an old issue of _Vanity Fair_ plastered with Angelina Jolie's cleavage that somebody had left behind. The articles were quite a lot less interesting than the advertisements, which consisted largely of women in varying states of undress. Her furret Snoops sat on the windowsill, watching people walk on the street below. Delilah gave her a cherry tomato, which she ate adorably.

The next morning she went to run errands with Alana MacKenzie and another girl named Keanna Sherman. They were both a little older than Delilah, in their mid-twenties; Keanna especially was quite serious about pokémon and had been doing it for a while. She had placed more than once at the Johto League Silver Conference, so she had some notoriety among other more dedicated trainers in the area.

"I had some of my pokémon's ID photos reshot," she said. "I just have to pick them up at the photo studio."

First they went to the grocery store. Inside the Trader Joe's there was a photo of Lance Siegfried and a little plaque declaring that this was his favorite place to buy salsa, or something. Lance Siegfried used to be a member of the Elite Four but now, due to unusual circumstances, he was the Pokémon League World Champion and had been for the last two years, having emerged undefeated from the annual Pokémon League Championship Tournament once again that summer. He trained mostly dragon-types and was a source of "local" pride, originally from Blackthorn, a quaint mountain town in eastern Johto.

"Lance Siegfried? I don't see what is the big deal about him," said Alana as they passed his picture. "I mean, Elite Four, sure, but he's only Champion because Red Ketchum disappeared. And he's not _that_ cute, really."

"He's actually a really good friend of mine," said Keanna. "He's a really sweet guy, he's _so_ nice. Just really sweet." Usually when people said things like this Delilah assumed they were making it up, but, she supposed, the world of pokémon was a smallish world so maybe it really wasn't that unlikely for people to know each other.

"Oh? That's cool," said Alana. "I mean, I'm not saying he's not a good trainer, 'cuz he obviously is. It's just, I don't see why people make such a big deal about him."

"Well, the reason _he's_ such a big deal is because _Red_ was such a big deal," said Delilah as Keanna examined melons. "How old was Red Ketchum when he won the Championship, fourteen? People were freaking out about him. So anyone who would replace him was probably going to be loved or hated by the public."

"Well, that's true," said Alana. "Let's look at the free samples. I remember my boyfriend was upset when Lance was made Champion, haha."

"Sure," said Delilah. "I mean, remember, Blue Oak wouldn't even take the title back, so they offered it to him."

"Yeah, well, a lot of people thought that wasn't fair," said Keanna. "'Cuz Lance didn't have to fight for the title."

"I know, that's what I mean," said Delilah. "So people were saying he was overrated, and stuff. But then, after like a year of calling him overrated, it was starting to be a cliché, so people started saying he was _under_rated. But now, if _everybody_ thinks he's underrated, then he's actually on his way to being _over_rated again!"

Alana laughed. "So which is it?" she asked. "Is he underrated or overrated?"

Delilah shrugged.

"I think he's underrated," said Keanna.

"It just depends on what the general consensus is," said Delilah.

Delilah sometimes had to wonder if people were a little weirded out by the way she participated in conversations. She did not talk very much, but occasionally broke in with some long-winded and probably incoherent point that was sometimes only vaguely related to the topic at hand.

Keanna had them stop at Starbucks and then the photo studio—which was, for some reason, seemingly abandoned.

"That's weird," she said. "This is where they told me to go."

"Is there anybody inside?" asked Alana, peering in through the door, which had a big "NOW HIRING" sign on it. "It's unlocked..."

She opened the door. Inside it was dark and very empty. "Should we go in...?" asked Keanna.

They did and Alana found the lights. There was a desk, presumably for a secretary, and on the walls were many photos of pokémon, some with trainers and some without. There were several open, half-unpacked boxes, as if somebody were in the process of moving in or moving out.

"This is weird," said Alana, looking around as Keanna approached the front desk and Delilah looked into the boxes. Some of them held camera equipment, and others were full of costumes and typically "wacky" photo studio dress-up like clown noses, and tacky sunglasses.

"This isn't where I had the pictures done; it's just where I was told to pick them up," said Keanna. "It's kind of scary..."

"They probably shouldn't leave this kind of stuff out, with the doors unlocked," said Alana, examining a camera set up on a tripod.

"I found my pictures," said Keanna, appearing next to her holding an envelope with her name on it in Sharpie. "These are them."

"Did you already pay for them? Can you just take them?"

"Look at all these costumes, you guys," said Delilah, poking tentatively in one of the boxes. "I think this one is me..." She held up a very ugly mermaid costume, the tail and top connected by an obvious panel of flesh-colored fabric.

Alana rummaged gleefully in the box. "Who would take a picture with their pokémon, dressed as a French maid?" she asked.

"Many people—judging by the smell," said Delilah.

"Look—wigs...!"

"Ohmygod, look, a Team Rocket uniform."

Keanna laughed. "You have to try it on," she said.

So she put it on. "I wonder if it's real, or just a costume," she said.

"It looks pretty good," said Alana, wearing what appeared to be a World War II nurse outfit. "Sexy. Come on, let's take a picture!"

"No, we better not," said Keanna, who was in a cheap-looking shiny saloon girl outfit. "They'd probably find out somehow."

"Yeah," agreed Delilah. "Maybe by the fact that we'd be leaving film with pictures of us on it..."

Alana settled for some silly cell phone pictures.

"When is your badge match?" she asked Delilah, after Keanna dropped them off back at the pokémon center that evening and they found out that the elevator had never been broken of course.

"The twenty-ninth," she said, letting Toast walk across her legs. "Have you registered for one yet?"

"No, not yet," she said, as her phanpy sat next to her, sniffing her toiletries. "I want to make sure I'm ready, you know?"

"Yeah."

"I mean, I've only been here a couple days."

"Right, yeah."

Toast tried to step into Delilah's bag on the bed, and Alana laughed.

"Hey!" said Delilah, heaving her off of the bag and laughing. "You know, I wouldn't mind, if you weren't shedding like crazy...!"

She was relieved for the distraction, because, however much progress she was making with pokémon, she still thought it was very boring, certainly not difficult. She had only won two badges, but she hardly ever lost matches, and when she did, they were usually one-on-one. She was constantly praised and complimented on her battling but she didn't really see why. Delilah had always known that she was good, but was she really _that_ good? When she honestly thought about it, she didn't think she really deserved to be that good. She didn't really love pokémon training. It was rewarding in the same way that school had been, but not particularly enjoyable, at least not anymore. The novelty had worn off, but had never been replaced with passion. Some people talked about pokémon training with such ardent passion that she had to envy them a little bit. She had met trainers who had won matches only once or twice but who nevertheless had a burning, fervid attachment to the world of training.

Delilah had never really had strong, deep feelings about anything; she was too analytical, too cold, too pococurante. But she won matches all the time! Where did she get off, really! Shouldn't she be a little more grateful? Why should she be so good at something that she didn't really care about either way? Delilah didn't really care about anything very much lately.

She was okay with it.


	3. Problem Child

**03 Problem Child**

The trolley station by the Ecruteak pokémon center was also by a little café meant for early morning commuters to buy lattés and pastries, contributing to its interesting and complex scent. Top notes of cheese omelets and animal food unfolded to reveal a full-bodied cocktail of anxiety and generic hotel soap mingling around a rich romantic heart of sweat and rubber.

It was quite a lot to take in, as Delilah sat there blinking and observing what seemed, through a veil of sleep deprivation and oppressive heat, to be the surreal arbitrariness of human existence at nine o'clock in the morning. There was a training seminar or convention of some kind at the Ecruteak Gym that day, and she was curious what it would involve. A wangsta type was walking by when the trolley pulled in. As she stood up he looked at her and made a pleased little "oh" sound.

"How are _you_?" he asked her, stopping dead in his tracks.

"Fine," she answered, and got on the trolley, realizing how rude she must have come off. And besides, as a white man trying to be black, he probably already deserved her pity. But what else was she supposed to say?

Depending on what part of town she was in, Delilah usually merited either a once-over (sometimes a twice-over), a drive-by come-on such as "hello, beautiful", or people leaning out of cars yelling at her in Spanish. One day she had looked apparently so good that it had driven a white man outside the public library to address her as "_damn_, girl!"

These last, more conspicuous reactions, of the loud and spectacular variety, were those that most intrigued her, and of which she frequently found herself skeptical after-the-fact—not because she didn't think she deserved them, but because they were so unsubtle, and so clichéd, that she found it difficult to believe that they could be performed without irony. Indeed she had to think that, women's lib regardless, the reason there were so fewer catcalls on street corners than half a century before was simply because they had become a philistine and embarrassing stereotype.

Delilah knew that she was perhaps ostentatiously unreceptive to flirtation, so probably she was intrigued by these because they were trite and obvious enough to penetrate her dense aura of academic obliviousness. If a boy just started talking to her, she never assumed he was flirting with her; and since she never looked at boys, she never saw them looking at her. Delilah just didn't see people through a paranoid lens of dating potential, the way it seemed everybody else did.

When she got off the trolley it seemed to be sunnier and hotter than she remembered it being when she got on, despite the ride only having lasted a few minutes. There were a lot of people milling around outside; she saw Whitney Delwyn talking to Ecruteak's gym leader, Morty Preston, and his boyfriend Eusine. She was going to approach them when she was intercepted by one of the people who frequently wandered gym courtyards dispensing flyers and political propaganda.

"Hi! Do you have a minute?"

Delilah stopped, as if she had walked into a wall.

Delilah really did not want to have a minute.

"Um...I don't know, how long of a minute?"

A little shiver of a laugh escaped her. "Just, like, a minute," she said, which cleared up a lot.

Delilah agreed reluctantly. She had the limpest handshake she had ever felt.

"We're trying to get California to be the first state to ban Styrofoam," she said, and launched into a carefully rehearsed speech about the island of trash and dead dewgongs that was probably longer than a minute and which ended with a rather brazen plea for paying memberships that made Delilah feel extremely uncomfortable.

"Um...well, I am FLAT broke right now. I literally have two dollars on me. I mean, I'm just a pokémon trainer, and my pokémon are my first priority, of course, but, I mean, do you have a website, maybe?" she asked, thinking this was quite shrewd of her because it made it sound like she would look into it further.

"We certainly do have a website," she said, opening her binder to hand Delilah a flyer with sea animals on it, "but the reason we're trying to get memberships right now is really to raise money, so, I mean, even a two dollar donation would be appreciated."

This bluntness stunned Delilah into a state of awkwardness severe enough that she did donate her last two dollars.

"Now, I wonder if you'd like to sign this postcard, which we're going to send to Governor Schwarzenegger to show how many of us support this idea."

"Oh, so it's a petition?" asked Delilah, who signed anything that was put in front of her but who only honored these agreements by accident.

"Um...it's not really a petition," she said, as if it were a bad word. "It's just a way to show your solidarity on this issue."

So it was a petition.

"I just think it's important, to raise awareness, you know?"

"Oh, sure," said Delilah, pausing on the postcard as she struggled to remember her phone number. "I mean, you know, the environment...I live in it, so..."

She laughed her tremulous, pained laugh again. "Right, exactly."

Delilah gave up on her phone number, and just made it up as she went along, realizing that her cavalier behavior was probably very disrespectful.

She was now dead broke; she just had to find someone with the same number of badges as she had so they could battle...but who would even want to battle for money, at a training seminar...?

She sighed. Well, she didn't really need money _today_; she had pokémon food back at her room in the pokémon center, and she could make a quesadilla or something...and anyway she didn't even really _have_ to eat, after all she did it every day.

Having lost sight of Morty and the others, she scanned the crowd for Whitney's pink hair; she found them, talking to Keanna Sherman and a guy named Tom Joyner.

"I went to New York over the weekend," Tom was saying.

"Hi, you guys, hope you don't mind my interruption..."

"Hey, Delilah!" said Whitney, hugging her. "Nice to see you!"

Keanna and Tom hugged her too. "You were saying, New York...?"

"Right," he said. "We had tickets to see Agatha Keen battle Felix Andronikos—you know, the US Champion last year?"

"Yeah? Lucky!" said Whitney. "How was it?"

"It was sooo bad," he laughed, shaking his head. "It was such a boring match, ohmygod."

"Aww! I know him," said Keanna. "He is the nicest guy."

"Well, that doesn't mean it wasn't a horrible match!" he said, and laughed.

The festival officially began with Morty giving a battle demonstration. Delilah watched for a while before Whitney took her to look at the vendors set up around the gym's courtyard, selling things like ethnic jewelry and other souvenirs.

"Oh, I like that," said Whitney, pointing to a beaded tribal necklace.

"Yeah, that's pretty."

She looked at the price tag. "Yeesh," she said, making a face. "No thanks..."

"The earrings are not so expensive..."

"Oh, look, there's Adam Harlow," said Whitney.

Delilah looked. She had not seen Adam Harlow since he had abandoned her in the middle of the National Park Friendship Garden, which was a funny story now that it wasn't happening anymore. He was sexily charring his lungs, aloof and supercilious while a girl attempted conversation with him.

"He thinks he is sooo cool," said Whitney, laughing. "Well, he is, but he thinks he is, too."

Delilah laughed. "What a douche..."

Adam smirked a little, and for a minute Delilah thought she could see the girl's knees tremble. It was like watching prey being played with on a nature documentary. Any minute, it seemed, the camera would pan out and reveal that David Attenborough had been standing there all along, narrating in real-time.

She looked back at the earring rack and spun it halfheartedly, not really paying attention since she couldn't buy any of them anyway. Oh well, maybe she had saved a dewgong's life. Apparently money could do that.

"Do you like this ring?" asked Whitney, slipping on a ring shaped like a snake.

"Yeah, that's really cool."

Whitney looked at her hand carefully. "Do you like the gold, or the silver?"

"I like both. What would you wear more?"

"Hi, girls," said someone. They looked up and saw Art Christiansen standing on the other side of the jewelry table.

"Hi, Art!" Whitney effused, replacing the ring. "I didn't know you were in Ecruteak; how long have you been here?"

"A while," he said. "Maybe a month."

"Have you registered for a badge—ohmygod! What time is it? I'm supposed to help Morty with a demo at eleven..."

"It's after 10:30," said Art, holding up his wrist to show his watch.

"Yikes! I better go. I'll see you guys later—come watch me when I'm on!"

She bounded away. Before Delilah had ever spoken to Art Christiansen, she had thought he might be cool or funny, based on an _Invader Zim_ tattoo he had on his leg, but somehow he really was not. Delilah was rarely right about people. Whenever she made up her mind she always ended up being wrong, so usually she avoided decisions, and somehow even her opinions were always wrong. She was still trying to work that one out.

"She's a trip," said Art.

"Yep," said Delilah. A second passed and she realized he wasn't going to say anything else so she asked, "So, have you registered for a badge match?"

"Nope, not yet. So, we're all going to go to Mulligan's after the gym closes," he said. "Are you coming? You and Alejandra can have milk and cookies."

She rolled her eyes, and he laughed, even though she was genuinely sick of this joke, which he had made last week, and the week before, when somebody mentioned going to Mulligan's after the gym closed on Thursdays, because she and Alejandra Cardona were not twenty-one. What kind of people got drunk on Thursday nights? Alcoholics, maybe, and people who thought Fridays were too dangerous, and apparently pokémon trainers. "Let's go watch the demo," she suggested, so they wouldn't have to keep talking to each other.

"I guess you're not really into the karaoke bar thing, are you?"

"Yeah...no."

"It's fun, though," he said as they walked to the outdoor battle court. "It's fun just to see everybody outside of work."

"Yeah, well, maybe for you," she said, not meaning it in a bitchy way, but she realized immediately how condescending it sounded.

He didn't. "You know, though, if we all get a table, they won't card you. You don't have to buy your own drinks."

"That's okay. I don't really drink anyway."

"Well, still, though," he said. "It's fun to see everybody, when you don't have to work."

Just how much effort, she wondered, did these people really put into pokémon training such that they felt so strong a need to "relax" afterward? Delilah barely considered pokémon her "job", because it required so little "work".

"What about the karaoke?" He continued doggedly pursuing the subject, because apparently he _lived_ for Thursday nights at Mulligan's. "Don't you like karaoke?"

"Not especially," she said.

"Gosh!" he said, and laughed. "You're no fun!"

"I'm plenty of fun!" she insisted. "I can't help if you're boring!"

He laughed, even though only her tone had been joking.

He was one of the least interesting people Delilah had ever met. She got the feeling he was sort of intimidated by her, probably because she wasn't very nice.

She happily ended up next to Tom Joyner, whom she liked quite a lot. "So, what would you think," he said, clapping his hands together gay-ly, "of a question about sexual preferences."

Delilah shrugged. "It wouldn't bother me," she said. "I wouldn't mind."

"Okay," he said, nodding.

So apparently the question wasn't for her.

No, it was for Adam Harlow, in his John Galliano jeans, his hair tumbling lusciously around his sunglasses like a Prince Matchabelli commercial or something.

Art got a look on his face that men seemed to get when confronted with Adam, as if he were beginning to suspect that he had forgotten his pants and hoped that the reason nobody told him was because they hadn't noticed.

"So, Adam," said Tom, "this is a random question, but if you don't mind my asking, what is your sexual orientation?"

Adam looked surprised. "Oh," he said. "I'm straight."

"Okay, thank you."

"That's quite flattering, though, thank you."

"No, thank you, I'm glad you're flattered. I was worried you might be offended."

"No, it means I look nice, doesn't it?"

The demo ended, replaced with a man allegedly talking about pokémon, but he really seemed to be talking about how much he hated the government while flyers were passed out to the crowd.

"This is quite boring, isn't it," Adam "asked" her.

"Yeah, the battle demos are more interesting, I think."

"Do you find them helpful?" he asked. "Do you think your battling has matured beyond the skills of a common Rocket?"

"What?" She laughed. "Pretty tough talk from someone who's lost to me twice, don't you think?"

He turned and looked at her.

She raised an eyebrow.

"How's four-on-four?" he said. "Twenty dollars."

"Okay," she agreed right away.

They went inside the gym, which was quite empty, and found a battle court to use.

She didn't think it was very likely that she would lose, especially a match as long as a four-on-four, but she wasn't sure what she would do in the event that she did. She didn't have twenty dollars to give him; was that against the law, or something?

She won anyway.

She wondered if perhaps her pokémon skills were making her irresponsible, betting money that did not, strictly speaking, exist. She would never do this on a one-on-one match, or against a gym leader, but she often found it shocking how much better she was at battling than other trainers, even if they had the same number of badges.

"Oh, whatever," was all Adam said before he left in a huff.

Delilah could have barely cared less, although this somewhat petty display left enough of an impression on her that she mentioned it that evening, eating dinner with a group of people from the gathering. She had only meant to bring it up in a quick "what a weirdo" comment, but Eusine's eyes lit up and he seized the subject with gusto.

"Well, you know," he said, "he's famous back where we come from. Sort of."

"What do you mean?" asked Delilah.

"His dad," said Whitney. "You might have heard about it. You know Team Rocket, that broke up a few years ago?"

"Yeah."

"Adam Harlow's dad is Giovanni Harlow. He used to be a gym leader, in the UK."

"Do you remember all of that," asked Eusine, "with Red Ketchum, right as he was becoming Champion?"

"Yeah, I do," said Delilah. "I was in high school."

"Oh, so I guess you weren't training yet then?" asked Whitney. "That was an exciting time to be into pokémon."

"But back to Adam Harlow," said Eusine eagerly. "For what reasons would you expect somebody like him to be famous?"

"I don't know," said Delilah. "I guess he is good at pokémon..."

"Well, that's a valid skill," he said dismissively. "Adam Harlow is only famous really for being Adam Harlow."

"Oh?"

He nodded enthusiastically, apparently enjoying telling a story, knowing something that she didn't. "It started out, when his father was being tried, or whatever, he would sometimes say something obnoxious, and they'd print it. But _then_...!"

Delilah waited for him to continue; when he didn't, she said, "Yes?"

"First of all," said Eusine, "I think you should try to imagine being his father."

"What a nightmare."

They laughed. "But think," said Eusine. "You're accused of being involved with organised crime. Maybe it's true, maybe it's not—it doesn't matter. You're a gym leader billionaire and now that's all at risk, and your child spills a drink on the Astounding Mandi and creates a scene at some posh soirée. But, eventually, your team of well-paid lawyers sorts everything out, and your name is cleared, and it seems like a good time to just fade into comfortable obscurity. Right? Are you immersed?"

"Yeah, I got it," said Delilah.

"Remember," said Eusine, "you've gone through months of horrible stress when you thought you'd go to prison or something, not to mention you've been in the news with people probably calling you bad names even if there's no proof. It's very bad, okay? But it's over. It's finally over."

"Yeah, I get it," she said. "What is this leading up to?"

"Well, then your son enters the picture again," he said. "Do you know what he did, right as everything was beginning to blow over?"

"No, I don't," she said. "Please, tell me."

"A sex scandal," he revealed conspiratorially. "He slept with a Member of the British Parliament. He was nineteen, and she was more than twice that, and married."

"Wow," said Delilah. "How...typical."

"So, he's not famous over here, because why would Americans care about British politicians?" he said rhetorically. "And it's not like he's an A-lister or anything, he's more like an M-lister, but you do see him in the rags now and then, over there. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if his family's holidaying here to try to get away from that for a while."

"How embarrassing," said Delilah.

"His parents must be saints to put up with him," said Whitney.

"He's probably spoilt to hell and back," said Eusine. "You can tell."

They were eating with an older couple named Bobby and Charity Horn; Bobby was on a creepy, serious, annoying, margarita-fueled political rant about nothing in particular. "I mean, Morty, look at you," he said. "You're a very respectable guy, you're a goddamn gym leader, you're a fucking sweetheart of a guy. You should be allowed to get married, you know?"

"Yeah, sure," said Morty, who looked uncomfortable.

"I mean, do you want to get married?"

"Well, I don't know, I mean..."

"Well, anyway, it doesn't matter," Bobby continued. "The point is, fuck them! What do they know anyway, fucking idiots. Fuck 'em. Fuck 'em, fuck 'em, fuck 'em."

"Oh, would you shut up, Bobby," said Charity. "Who's going to listen to you anyway, you need a goddamn haircut..."

"That guy is totally staring at me."

"Whitney, ugh!" exclaimed Eusine. "Would you stop that! All the time, you think everybody is looking at you!"

"He _is_!" she hissed.

"He's not necessarily looking at _you_," said Delilah. "He might be looking at something near you or behind you."

"But he is, though," Whitney insisted. "Like, he's not even checking me out, he's just totally staring at me..."

Delilah glanced surreptitiously at the man in question. He was a creepy kind of biker-y guy; she couldn't tell if he was looking at Whitney, but he was looking at something, with a very dark, impassive glare.

Whitney humphed. "Fucker."

Delilah burst out laughing.

They left the restaurant and what followed might have made more sense to Delilah if she had been drinking as well. Before taking the Horns back to their "shithole" they decided to go up Ecruteak Boulevard to see if they could find their sons, who were having some kind of party; on the way they passed the Gym. "Awww, it's closed," said Charity.

"It's nine o'clock at night," Eusine muttered to nobody, but Delilah laughed, and he looked like he appreciated it.

They drove into a parking lot and the Horns looked up at a random building.

"Hey!" said Charity. "That's Jacob! In the window, with the guitar, see! God, he needs a haircut!"

Bobby strained to look. "What, up there? There?"

"What the fuck," Eusine muttered.

Instead of just rolling down the window, Charity opened the whole door to shout up to Jacob; she and Whitney got out of the car to smoke a cigarette and yell things up at the sons while the rest of them sat inside making awkward conversation.

Finally Bobby yelled "FUCK 'EM!" and said he wanted to go home. The entire drive back he chanted "fuck 'em, fuck 'em, fuck 'em, fuck 'em" much to Eusine's unimpressed annoyance.

Morty took the Horns home and then dropped Delilah at the pokémon center. "Sorry about all the distractions," he said.

Delilah laughed. "That's okay," she said.

"Fuck 'em," mumbled Eusine.


	4. FilthyGorgeous

**04 Filthy/Gorgeous**

The only pokémon Delilah had ever caught herself was her furret Snoops; her four others had all been given to her. If she wanted to participate in the Silver Conference Championship Tournament in the summer, she had to have a full team of six pokémon.

Really, she didn't particularly want to participate, but after winning four badges in four months everybody told her she should, and she didn't have anything better to do. Tom Joyner, who was also in Ecruteak, told her about a trail he was taking to Goldenrod; but it also went to Olivine, so she decided to go with him, and find out if there were any pokémon to be seen.

This was not something she usually did; she usually took public transportation to get to another city, or got a ride with somebody heading to the same place. But she decided to give it a try, to see if she could find any pokémon, and anyway it wasn't that long, only a couple of miles, and she didn't think there would be a lot of mosquitoes now that it was getting cool.

She was slightly concerned, since Tom was a friend of Art Christiansen's, who was a runner, so she wondered if he would insist on power-walking or intense off-trail hiking, but she quite liked Tom, and they had had some fun together at the Gym or the library.

"I think it's a pretty popular trail, for pokémon trainers," said Tom. "We'll probably see some others there, even though it's not really a nice day..."

They did; in the building at the start of the trail they met Adam Harlow and Michael Jacobs.

"So where are you guys headed?" asked Delilah.

"I'm going to Bonitaville," said Michael. Bonitaville was a neighborhood in northern Goldenrod, apparently where the trail ended.

"That's where I'm going!" said Tom.

"I'm going to Olivine," said Adam.

"That's where Delilah's going!"

"I guess we'll be separating at some point, then," said Michael.

"At least we'll all have a friend," said Tom.

Michael and Delilah said "aww" at the same time, and laughed.

Spirits were high and conversation was fun as they walked the trail for about half an hour.

Then they separated.

Delilah had been slightly dreading this moment, since she knew Adam didn't really like her, and she did not particularly care for him.

"Well!" she said, after saying goodbye to Tom and Michael. "I guess we're traveling buddies."

He was unenthused. "I guess."

"Oh, I was just being polite," she said in a mock bitchy voice.

He just shrugged.

She laughed. "I'm just joking!" she said, exaggerating her inflection to entertain herself.

"Delilah..." He looked up into the misty rain, sighing heavily. "You joke about joking," he said. "You joke about joking about joking. How many layers of irony are really necessary? Can you even tell when you're being sarcastic?"

"Sometimes..."

"See? Even that's a joke, isn't it."

She scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Chill out," she said.

They walked in silence for a few moments and then he asked, "So what are you doing in Olivine, badges?"

"Yeah," she said. "And my aunt and uncle live there, and Christmas is coming, so, you know. What about you? Why did you decide to try the footpath?"

"I thought I'd see what kinds of animals I could find," he said. "See if anything was worth catching. What kinds of animals live in Johto, really?"

"Um...well, there are lots of snakes, and rodents. Different kinds of birds, xatus. Um, houndooms, and persians. Charizards, too, but they would mostly live on reserves and stuff, you know. They're protected, I don't know if you still find them in the wild. Of course, we're probably not going to see all or any of these."

"That's true," he said. "I'm not getting my hopes up. I just figured I might as well go this way, now I haven't got my motorbike."

"No? What happened to it?"

He seemed to think about this for a moment and then he said, "It broke."

"...Okay," she said. "So, what are you doing in Johto? Are you here for badges?"

"More or less," he said. "My father's got business here, and my mother and I came along. They go back and forth sometimes, here and England, but we're here until next summer. We're at the Piedra Blanca in Olivine, that's why I'm going there, 'cos my stupid dad wouldn't have a car sent for me. Can he expect me to take the bus? Surely not! He's upset with me."

"Why?"

His manner suddenly changed dramatically. "I broke something," he said, scornfully impatient with his father's lack of reason and understanding. "And he wants me to have my hair cut."

She laughed. "Are you going to?"

"No. I mean, it annoys me that I have to comb my hair out every time I wash it...and it annoys me how much of it gets in the drain...and it annoys me that it takes so long to dry..."

"So why don't you get a haircut?"

"Because! It annoys my parents more!"

She was hoping he would say something like that.

She laughed; he didn't.

The color growing out of Adam's head was really very striking. It wasn't orange; there was nothing carroty or fiery about it. It wasn't a spicy, earthy red; it was cold, with no blond in it. Adam's hair was a stop sign that said, "Hey, look at me. Now look at me again."

There was a break in the clouds in the distance, and the sun shining through looked quite poetic as it began to set. They had been walking for what felt like a very long time, and her legs hurt, and it felt like she was getting a blister on her foot. The path had faded into nothingness at some point and they seemed to be walking in the middle of nowhere.

"Do you think we're actually on the trail anymore?" she asked. "There's no more path...do you think we're actually going anywhere?"

"We're going somewhere," he said.

They walked for a while without speaking as it got darker until he abruptly asked her, "So why haven't you got a boyfriend?"

The question caught her off-guard. Her jaw didn't drop, but it certainly thought about it. Why would he ask her something like that? Was it a judgment of her character, or academic curiosity, or a sexual overture, or bitter social commentary?

She gazed stupidly at him, trying to comprehend the question's context, long enough that he repeated, unruffled, "Why not?"

She blinked, becoming aware of her shocked expression and attempting to soften it. "How would you know if I have a boyfriend or not?" she asked, trying consciously not to sound defensive.

"Well, have you got one, then?"

"No."

He shrugged. "Well, then, I was right. I'm only curious."

"Well, I mean, I don't know," she stammered, trying to verbalize something she had never given much thought. "I'm just, I guess, I don't know, I am not interested in dating, I guess."

"Clever girl," he said, and that was it.

Maybe it wasn't _that_ weird of a question; maybe it wasn't _that_ keen of an observation. Maybe if she had a boyfriend it would affect her body language around Adam, or the way she spoke to him. And besides, judging by the tabloid articles Eusine had shared with her, Adam probably had a sixth sense about female availability.

It was quite an experience to read about Adam after already having met him. Occasionally the magazines referred to him as "Adam Harlot", always doing something noteworthy such as mouthing off to authority figures or getting kicked out of a pub for urinating on the floor like some sort of psychologically questionable courtship display for the paparazzi. At any rate, whether he was sneering, snarling, or scowling, his irresponsibly handsome face and visually arresting coloration was extremely photographable and it was really no wonder that the media would be interested in him.

They had, at least, found the road again. Adam stopped and picked something up off the ground.

"Hey, look at this," he said.

It was a ten dollar bill. "Cool," she said, hoping it was a sign of civilization.

"This is the same colour as my eyes," he said, holding it up to his face.

"Yes...I guess so," she agreed.

"Well, anyway," he said, tossing it back to the ground. "I was about to say—"

"Wait a minute," she said, bending to pick it up. "Don't you want this?"

"Why?"

"Why not? Why would anybody want ten dollars?"

"I wasn't aware they did," he said. "Nobody needs ten dollars badly enough just to pick it off the filthy street."

She made a face at him. "What a snob!" she said.

"Ten dollars!" he scoffed. "What will that buy you, anyway? A grape?"

"Well, I'll keep it, then, if you don't want it."

"It's only money," he said. "Exactly how wild can a person get with ten dollars? Besides, money doesn't buy happiness."

"Certainly not," she agreed. "But it makes misery much more enjoyable."

"There are more important things."

"Oh, sure! And your rich father can buy you all of them."

"I hate money," he said. "I think it's disgusting, the way people treat it. If you picked up a toy or a sweet or a shirt or something off the ground all you'd hear is, 'eeuugh, you don't know where that's been do you, put it down, wash your hands,' but money? A bit of paper that you _know_ has been handled by hundreds and hundreds of people, and who knows what else. No, even if it's got a lip print and coffee stains on it, no, that's fine to pick up."

"Yeah, you know, I heard that something like 80% of all banknotes have traces of cocaine on them..."

It was getting sort of dark. Delilah let Toast out and had her flare her ruff to give them some light.

"I didn't think the trail was this long," she said. "I thought we would have made it by now."

"Maybe we got lost," he said. "Maybe we're on an entirely different trail now, taking us to Los Angeles, or Mexico, or something..."

This was an exciting, if rather painful possibility. She felt fairly confident now that she had developed a blister on her foot which had had been smashed, reinflated, and smashed again several times on this walk. She was wearing her most outdoorsy shoes, which were Keds, which were not really very outdoorsy, and they were sort of wet. Adam was wearing green Hunter rainboots, very British with his long tweed coat.

After a while, they were lucky enough to see a building with lights on ahead of them. There was a distinctly horsey smell on the air, and they both stopped dead when they saw a man ushering a miltank into what was apparently a barn.

"Cows?" Delilah exclaimed. "What! We must be near the county limits or something by now!"

Adam didn't say anything.

"Hey, you know what we should do?" she said.

He didn't answer.

"Say, you know what we should do?" she repeated in case he hadn't heard.

"How can I possibly know what 'we' should do?" he asked darkly. "_What_ should we do?"

She was sort of embarrassed to have been spoken to in such a manner. "We should ask the farmer where we are," she said lamely.

Adam looked like he was going to scream. Instead, he just groaned loudly.

They hurried up to the farmer, waving and calling to him.

He looked up and waited for them to approach him.

"Are you the farmer?" Delilah asked whiningly.

"Shut up, Delilah, I'll take care of this!" said Adam impatiently. "We're on our way to Olivine!"

"Are you the farmer?"

"Stop saying that, Delilah, of course he's the fucking farmer! How far is it to Olivine?"

"Well, let's see," said the farmer, squinting into the rain. "It's 24, 812 miles the direction you're going. But if you turn around, it's only thirteen miles."

Because it was so late, he and his wife let them use their guest bedroom and bathroom for the night, and said they would drive them into Olivine the next morning, which was very nice of them.

It was really a nice room. Adam looked at her. "Do you expect me to offer to sleep on the couch?" he asked.

She laughed. "I expect nothing from you," she said, putting her bag down on the bed. "I'm going to take a shower."

Adam was watching the television when she emerged from the bathroom. She sat on the bed and began to brush her hair. Suddenly he said, "I'm going to cut my hair."

He stood up. She raised her eyebrows. "Right now? Yourself?"

"Yeah. I'm going to give him a shock when he sees me."

"Okay," she said, and went back to the TV and brushing her hair. The more time she spent with him, Adam really only got weirder and weirder, cutting his hair in a stranger's house. She heard him rummaging around in the bathroom cabinets, and then he went quiet for a while.

After several minutes he lounged on the doorframe and said, "Delilah, have you got any kirby grips or anything like that."

"Any what?"

"You know, like, hair pins."

"Oh, like bobby pins?" she said, getting up and going to her bag.

"Yeah, it's the same thing."

"Oh. I didn't know."

She handed him the little pouch that held her hair clips and bands and things. It was pink with a graphic of SpongeBob playing a ukulele, but he did not comment on it.

"What do you need them for, anyway?" she asked.

"I'm doing a Mohican," he said, opening the zipper and looking inside. "So I'll need to clip back the hair I don't want to cut."

"Ohhhh...you're going to _really_ shock him."

"Yeah, it should be a laugh," he said humorlessly.

She ended up perching on the edge of the bathtub and doing the back for him.

"Do you know what my dad got me for my twentieth birthday?" he said as he sat in the empty tub.

She thought about it. "Venezuela?"

"Golf clubs," he said. "I hate golf. It is _so boring_."

"I never understood the rules..."

"I just figured I wouldn't ever touch them. I said, 'Daddy, you know that I'm never going to use these, ever.'"

"Well, I think you're done," she said, standing up and brushing some of his hair off of herself.

He stood up. "What a thoughtless gift! I didn't touch them for months until one day he dragged me golfing with his stupid 'associates'. And, _of_ course, I was amazing at it."

She laughed. "That's typical."

He looked in the mirror. "Brilliant," he said, fluffing what was left of his hair. "I hit it for the first time and it was just letter-perfect, just textbook-neat. And he said, 'Oh. Oh, uh. Well done, Adam.' That put me in such a bad mood, probably even worse than if I had been terrible at it. I just said, 'THANKS,' really snotty. After that day I never, ever touched them, ever again. And he never asked me to."

Adam had a rather lean and angular face with cheekbones that would spread a blush across the White Cliffs of Dover, so that such a rude and provocative hairstyle was flattering and quite chic.

"I'll just get in the shower and wash it now, I guess," he said. He had Sisley shampoo, the kind that cost $80 a bottle. Well, he did have beautiful hair, even in a Mohawk.

She went to bed, thinking that Adam really was a very strange person. She had a bit of a hard time believing that he was actually a real person, with a life and feelings and thoughts, and not just a decorative fixture in her life.

How could Adam be real? How could he possibly function in day-to-day living? He was so vibrantly exaggerated—he was ridiculously mean, ludicrously sexy, everything about him was absurd and stylized—how could he do anything as normal or unremarkable as brushing his teeth, buying pokémon food, catching a cold, reminiscing about his childhood, getting an eyelash in his eye? Presumably he did all of these things, but it all happened off-screen; and if a tree falls with nobody around to hear it, was Adam still a jerk? Delilah may have liked to look at her life as if it were an episode of an off-the-wall sitcom, but with a supporting character like Adam the metaphor itself became a caricature.

They laid there in silent darkness for what could have been minutes or hours before Adam whispered, "Delilah...?"

"What?"

"Are you asleep?"

"...Yes..."

He laughed a little.

She felt him shift around.

"Do you mind if I open that window?" he asked.

So, of course, nothing did happen. She thought this was really for the best because she was extremely ticklish.

If her life were a sitcom, Adam and Delilah would probably become friends after somehow accidentally getting roped into an embarrassing and generically wacky situation and being harmlessly entertaining for half an hour. Or if her life were a romantic comedy, they would probably bond over some shared interest in an obscure hobby so they would have a friendship to worry about ruining. Or if her life were a bad fanfiction, one of them would probably at some point walk in on the other naked and then run away blushing. Or if her life were a low-budget indie film, she would probably casually lose her virginity to him in a starkly-shot scene with no music and miltanks in the background.

But none of this happened. It was unsentimentally anticlimactic.

They were woken up at the unreasonable hour of seven o'clock. Of course, farmers probably got up around three or something.

"Ugh," said Delilah, wiping at her eyes. "I want to go back to bed..."

"Well...I want a Vicodin, but you don't always get what you want, do you."

She laughed. "Sleep is good for you," she said. "For a healthy body and a healthy mind."

He looked skeptical. "It all seems to be going to your body," he said.

Nobody mentioned his hairstyle, apparently assuming that it had always been like that and they just hadn't noticed because it was wet. Even when it wasn't charged, it still looked quite impressive. Adam had already had an overwhelming presence and the confrontational hairdo only intensified it.

Adam's exquisite, vicious face was the whitest she had ever seen, as colorless as paper; not ivory, or creamy, his skin had a rather bluish cast, and his eyes burned cold like jewels on a sheet. Everything about him made a person want to keep looking.

"Look at that bunch of miltanks," exclaimed Delilah as they drove by, amazed at how many there were.

"Herd," said Adam.

She smirked. "Heard what?"

"Herd of miltanks."

"Of course I've heard of miltanks, stupid."

He half-laughed and half-groaned. "No," he said. "A miltank herd."

"So? I don't care if a miltank heard. I don't have any secrets from a miltank."

"Ugh," he said, and laughed.


	5. No Feelings

**05 No Feelings**

At the Mahogany Gym one day it was suggested that they all partner up and try something new, like using each other's pokémon. Delilah did not generally have much preference when it came to partnerships, so she usually just waited to see who didn't have a partner at the end—but today, Michael Jacobs came up to her and said, "Delilah! Do you want to be partners?"

She smiled and said, "Yeah, sure!"

"How many badges have you got?"

"Six."

"Hey! You caught up to me. I'm just going to go to the bathroom first..."

She was really quite flattered by his interest, because she had always thought that Michael was cool and funny. He was flamboyantly gay, of the musical theater variety, and he was a very good pokémon trainer; she had never battled him before, because he had always had more badges than she did, and in gyms it was commonly accepted for trainers to battle others with the same number of badges, in the interest of fairness.

When Michael came back from the bathroom he said, "So how are you doing?"

"Fine," she said.

"Really? Are you just saying that?"

"Yeah. I have clinical depression."

He laughed.

Why didn't people believe she was telling the truth when she said she was fine? Did she seem mean? Maybe she did. Maybe she was.

"So, I heard Lance Siegfried is here in Mahogany," said Michael as they sat in the bleachers with Alejandra Cardona and Keanna Sherman.

"Really?" said Alejandra. "Where did you hear that?"

"Pryce told me."

"I wonder if he'll show up at the Gym sometime."

"And then, you know," he added, "Giovanni Harlow is here in Johto, and Adam Harlow."

Alejandra sighed judiciously. "Adam Harlow," she said. "I think he is really hot, and talented, but he is just so gross. I can't imagine what it must be like to see him walking down the street, it must be the scariest thing in the world."

"I saw him at the Wild Animal Park," said Keanna. "It was soooo trippy."

"I wouldn't mind battling one of them," said Alejandra.

Keanna laughed. "If you know what I mean..."

Alejandra laughed too. "I've seen some of both of their matches on YouTube. They're both really good."

"And they're both really good-_looking_..."

"I've battled Adam Harlow," said Delilah.

"So have I," said Michael. "He's tough."

"Yeah, he's very talented."

Michael looked at her and smirked. "I bet you won anyway," he said.

"Yeah, I did."

He laughed. "You're insane, Delilah," he said. "Delilah has only been collecting badges since last summer, and she already has six. Girl is disgusting."

They laughed.

"Oh, well," he said, standing up. "Do you want to battle?"

"Oh, I don't know," she said. "I might beat you and you wouldn't like it, or you might beat me and _I_ wouldn't like it..."

Birds of a feather flock together, perhaps. But Delilah didn't have a flock, and so in these group situations she usually ended up partnering with whoever was left over—and it was usually a girl, and it was usually a specific kind of girl. Delilah had been in this situation enough times, from training seminars to high school English projects to middle school PE activities, to recognize the type of person she usually ended up paired with.

This kind of girl was too shy to ask somebody to be her partner, and since nobody knew her very well (because she was shy) she never got asked herself. And so Delilah would wait to see who didn't get a partner, and this girl would be hanging around sort of lost, so Delilah would ask her, and she would smile and be very nice.

She was always very nice, and usually smart, but with a strangling shyness that prevented her from making many friends. She was the kind of person who read Jane Austen and always remembered birthdays. So she was a good person, but in truth Delilah always found her a little boring, because she was always quite serious, and if Delilah made a joke, she might laugh in politeness, but she always seemed a little hurt and overwhelmed by any sarcasm, even if Delilah was making fun of herself.

The fact that Delilah had encountered this type of person enough times to be able immediately to identify them spoke of their high numbers; this girl, however, apparently and unfortunately, was too shy to ever approach any of her own kind, despite the fact that Delilah constantly encountered them in PE and English and training classes. Because of the breadth of this group, Delilah knew that many people probably assumed she belonged to it, if only based on the fact that she was quiet.

But that was the difference: Delilah was quiet—not shy. She could talk to people if she wanted to; but she didn't want to, and she never did. She ended up among the partnerless, not because she was too scared to ask, but because she was too detached.

There was something different about Delilah, but she could not figure out just what it was. There was something that kept her apart from other people. There was something going on that she didn't quite understand. She just didn't fit in with the other people who didn't fit in. In fact, she fit in better with the people who _did_ fit in, but she just couldn't be bothered, probably because she was a bitch. She had never met a bigger bitch than herself, except for Adam Harlow, but he was a boy and apparently that was okay.

Later, Delilah and Michael decided to visit a little shop a block or so from the gym, and stood outside looking at the racks of postcards and things.

On the glass front of the shop were stuck a lot of funny signs and decals. Michael pointed to one that said, "Jedi Trained Here".

"Watch me levitate this chair with the Force," he said, waving his hand over a plastic lawn chair, which he jiggled with his foot.

Delilah burst out laughing. "I like this one," she said, pointing to one that said, "Just a Souvenir Shop, Nothing Suspicious about It, No Need to Be Alarmed".

He laughed. "That's cute," he said.

Inside, they wandered around for a while and ended up in the aisle with gift items like picture frames and scented candles.

"Ohmygod, Delilah," Michael whispered behind his hand. "Look, it's Lance Siegfried, he is in Mahogany..."

Lance Siegfried was standing inconspicuously in the middle of the aisle. "Pretty cool," said Delilah, not sure what she was supposed to say.

Michael sniffed various candles, and eventually Lance ended up next to them.

Then Delilah noticed something extraordinary.

"Oh my God, what is THIS!" she said, picking up a ceramic figurine.

It was a green elf or troll or something, and quite possibly the ugliest thing she had ever seen.

Michael fell into a fit of helpless laughter. Delilah caught Lance's eye and noticed he was trying not to laugh.

"Too good for the usual insincere Valentine's gift," he advised her seriously. "It wouldn't be properly appreciated."

"You're probably right," Delilah sighed sadly.

"Ohmygod I'm so excited to meet you," Michael blurted out.

Lance smiled. "It's nice to meet you too," he said. "What are your names?"

"Michael."

"Delilah."

"So can I assume you're pokémon trainers?" At their nods, he asked, "Will you be entering the Silver Conference this year? How many badges do you have?"

"We both have six, but Delilah got hers a lot faster, she's only been collecting badges since the summer!" Michael babbled, his face quite red.

"I'm impressed," said Lance. "Will you be entering the Silver Conference?"

"Oh, um, maybe," she said, trying to ignore the fact that she was a little pink herself. "Oh, but I only have five pokémon, though," she added, remembering with embarrassment how she had gotten lost with Adam in the California shrubland but still not caught any pokémon.

Lance looked behind himself. "Hey, do you feel a breeze?" he asked casually.

Delilah and Michael stood still. "Yeah, I do," said Michael.

"Maybe a little..."

"The door's closed," said Lance.

"Maybe there's a fan on," Michael suggested.

They chatted for a short while longer, and then Delilah and Michael made their purchases. Michael asked the man behind the counter about Jedi training, but he just looked at him blankly.

Delilah went back to the pokémon center and sat in the cafeteria, listening to Gabrielle Varnham unpack her woes about her breakup with Art Christiansen, whom she had dated while they were in Violet at the same time.

"It was so awkward and stupid," she said. "We were walking and then we stopped in front of the pokémon center. And he was looking around, not looking at me, and he said, 'I don't think we should see each other, romantically, anymore.' And I just, like...laughed. I was like, 'Hah! Okay, I can deal with that.' And then he basically ran away. Ugh! I can't believe _he_ dumped _me_! And then later I texted him just, 'why?' And he said, 'Actually there were a few things. I didn't want to talk about it and make you sad.' And then like a smiley face. Whatever, he was extremely boring anyway."

Delilah scoffed, feeling validated in her judgment of him. "How immature," she said. "Yeah, no offense, but I never got why you wanted to go out with him."

"Well, I didn't, really..."

"Then why did you?"

"Well, I don't know, I just...I don't know..."

"Anyway, I think that's an extremely offensive thing for him to say to you," she said.

"What, the text message?"

"Yeah. 'Cuz it's like, he's acknowledging that his reasons would upset you, but he's still not going to tell you? That's pointless, it defeats the purpose of not telling you."

"I guess," she said, but she didn't seem to be following, and she left soon after that.

Delilah wasn't sure if she would ever understand the preoccupation with the dating institution that seemed to leave no age bracket untainted. She truly did not see the appeal of it, and the fact that Adam Harlow was the only person to agree with her had her fearing slightly for her personal condition.

As Delilah finished eating, Lance Siegfried entered the emptying cafeteria; when he saw her, she smiled, and he approached her. "Delilah, right?"

"Yeah, Delilah."

"So you're the one who won six badges in about as many months?"

"Um, I guess," she said dumbly.

"Are you busy? I wonder if you'd like to help me out with something," he said, sitting down, apparently prepared to convince her.

"Umm...like what?"

"Have you heard the rumors about Team Rocket?" he asked, his voice lowering.

"About them coming back?"

He nodded. "They're not rumors," he said.

She already knew that, but she didn't say so.

"Do you want to help me out?"

"Um...I don't really understand what you want me to do," she said, having horrible flashbacks to her annoying Slowpoke Well adventure.

"There seems to be a kind of radio signal here in Mahogany that's affecting the pokémon that live at the Lake of Rage," he said. "What I want you to do is going to depend on what Team Rocket's doing, isn't it?"

"I guess," she said, still unsure if this was really a proper explanation.

She agreed to go with him, despite the possibility that he could secretly be a psychotic killer luring her into a bad part of town with his smooth voice and nice clothes so he could cut out her tongue or something. But worse things could happen, right?

He got his pokémon from the nurse and they walked down the street to the shop with the Jedi sign. He told her to wait outside for a minute, so she did. She thought maybe he needed to pick something up, although she didn't know why he wouldn't have just gotten it when he was there earlier.

She stood outside with Snoops, who was in a cuddly mood, leaning up against Delilah's legs and looking winsome until she picked her up and gave her some attention.

Eventually she got tired of waiting so she went into the store; inside she heard Lance say "Hyper Beam", and then the sounds of a scuffle and some swearing, and hushed, intense conversation. When she made it to the back of the store she saw Lance standing next to a shelf and a dragonite, and two men standing at a respectful distance, one of whom was the cashier that Michael had tried to joke with.

Lance turned to face her, and she saw next to the shelf a hole in the floor, presumably a trap door that the shelf had covered.

"Oh, Delilah," he said. He walked up to her and spoke to her in a low voice: "That radio signal is coming from here. The stairs are there. We should split up; I'll go first."

She watched as he went down the stairs with his dragonite. She wasn't sure if it were his instructions that were bad or if it was her comprehension that was bad, because she had no idea what she was supposed to be doing. Should her objective have been clearer to her? What had she missed?

She looked at the two men, who were looking at her, and smiled awkwardly at them. They did not respond in any way. She went down the stairs, and they said nothing.

Underneath the shop, the foot of the stairs grew out of the floor of a pristine, brightly lit hallway, empty except for a couple of statues of persians along the wall. It was so quiet her ears started to ring.

It was flattering, or something, that Lance had asked her to do something like this, maybe. After all, he was sort of a big deal when it came to pokémon, being World Champion. Delilah didn't think pokémon training was too terribly difficult, really. Everybody seemed to think she was very good at it, and maybe she was, but she didn't see how it was such an accomplishment. The hardest part of pokémon training was finding out if other people wanted to battle.

Then again, she supposed she _did_ have more time to devote to caring for her pokémon than most other people did, because she didn't have a "day job". But then, the reason she didn't was because she was good enough at pokémon battling that she didn't have to.

For a long time she wandered aimlessly through endless winding corridors over tasteful checkered linoleum as if she were in a horrible symbolic nightmare about anxiety and feelings of restriction that could probably have gotten her a robust prescription. There did seem to be something going on with a radio signal, because Snoops seemed to hear something that Delilah couldn't. She was worried that it might cause her physical discomfort, so she gave her a walnut and then recalled her.

Eventually she found another human, in a Team Rocket uniform. "Ummm, excuse me," she said, "have you seen Lance Siegfried anywhere?"

"Lance Siegfried?" he repeated, raising his eyebrows. "What would he be doing here?"

"You know, I really have no idea, but, I mean, I'm pretty sure he's here..." She started to look around a corner, and he grabbed her arm.

"Hey, watch it!" he said, pulling her back. "Sorry," he added when she rubbed her arm. "Just watch out, for the koffings. Just—why don't you just not go that way."

She had no idea what he was talking about, but she let him point her in a different direction.

"Well, good luck with whatever you're doing," he said.

She shrugged enormously to show that she had no idea what she was doing, and he laughed. "Yeah, you too, I guess," she said, and walked in the direction he had pointed her in.

She felt extremely suspicious, but maybe she didn't look that threatening. Maybe she looked so conspicuous that no one would ever suspect her. Maybe he thought she had been wearing a lab coat, or maybe he thought her "I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing" attitude was typical work-a-day cynicism.

She walked down some stairs, because that seemed to be all there was, and found Lance at the bottom of them, in front of a closed electric door.

"Are you all right?" he asked her. "Are your pokémon hurt, or tired?"

"No..."

"Okay. Keep it up," he said, and vanished up some stairs.

Why did he have to be so weird. It must be fame, she thought. It did strange things to people.

She glanced at the electric door. There was a big sign on it that said "The Radio Transmitter".

Well, that was helpful? She wondered if the person who had written that sign was also responsible for the unsuspicious one on the front of the shop. How postmodern, she thought, that whoever put it up knew that everyone would interpret it as a joke.

She continued wandering around and eventually found Lance and his dragonite again, standing next to a man in a Team Rocket uniform.

"Delilah, in order to unlock the door to the radio transmitter, you need the voice of a certain person: Petrel. I have found out he is hiding in their leader's office. Unfortunately though, that room is also protected with a password..."

"Huh?" asked Delilah to convey to him that he had made no efforts to let her know what was going on.

"Delilah, we need the password to their leader's office first," he said, and again disappeared.

Delilah looked at the man on whom Lance had presumably exerted forceful negotiation and threw her hands in the air to show that she had no idea what was going on. He gave her a tiny sympathetic smile, and she continued wandering around.

She hadn't even been thinking about what might happen if her life were a sitcom—that came up all by itself when Adam appeared.

She asked him, "Do you often frequent criminal hideouts?"

He looked at her weirdly. "Do you?"

She sighed and shrugged extravagantly. "Recently I seem to be doing it quite a bit! It's a thing."

"Oh, shut up. I don't have time for you. What do you want?"

She thought this was quite rude, considering she had helped him with his hair and had thought they had been getting along okay before. "Do you know the password for the leader's room?" she asked.

"Why are you asking?"

She sighed heavily. "I don't even know."

He looked through her like cellophane. "It's 'slowpokeraticate'," he said. "All one word."

"Oh. Thanks," she said, not having expected him to tell her. "How do you know?"

"Are you here with Lance Siegfried?" he asked her abruptly.

"Um, yeah."

He pressed his lips together, frowning in reflection. "My pokémon were no match at all," he reflected bitterly.

"Oh. Well, I mean...he is _Lance Siegfried_, he is Pokémon League World Champion..."

He sighed, leaning his head back, which accentuated the angle of his throat, and she felt a peculiar temperature change at its delicately masculine appeal. "I don't care that I lost," he said. "It's what he said that bothers me...he told me that I don't trust my pokémon enough."

His perfect Roman nose wrinkled in disgust.

"...Humph!" he humphed. "I don't have time for you!"

"Whatever," she said, and watched him walk away, because she liked the way he walked.

She wandered around until she found a door with the name Petrel on it. She looked around, as if waiting to see somebody to encourage her. There was a keypad on the door. She entered 'slowpokeraticate', which she thought was an extremely long password, and it unlocked.

In the room there was a desk and a table covered in boxes of manila folders; along the wall were shelves of books and poké balls, and a birdcage with a murkrow in it. When she opened the door, a man looked up from a computer.

"Oh," she said. "Excuse me..."

She was going to leave awkwardly but he said, "I've been waiting for you."

She looked at him blankly, hoping she hadn't met him before and created an awkward moment by not remembering him.

"It's me, Giovanni," he said, gesturing to himself.

"...Oh...okay...?"

"What, I don't sound like him? I don't even look like him, what? I worked hard on this!"

He looked like Bing Crosby and sounded like Tom Waits. She didn't say so.

"You must be trying to sneak into the radio-transmitter room," he said casually, standing up and taking off his coat to reveal a Team Rocket uniform underneath. It was a little different from most of the others she had seen, so she assumed he was of a higher rank. "Well, that's not going to happen," he said, walking up to her, stopping only when he was directly in front of her.

She leaned back, only very slightly, but he noticed, and leaned forward.

"That room is protected with a special password," he told her in a gravelly whisper, tapping her chin with his finger. Then he leaned back and raised his voice back to normal to say, "Giovanni."

He smiled in a sort of knowing, cocky way, and laughed.

"The password is 'Giovanni'," he said, removing a poké ball from his belt. "Surprised to hear it from me? Just knowing the password won't help you. It only reacts to my voice."

He expanded the poké ball and released a zubat. She looked at it, not realizing he wanted to battle until he made an encouraging hand gesture and she felt sort of embarrassed.

She won anyway.

He was very complimentary upon his defeat, exclaiming about her strength and skill.

"I couldn't do a thing," he said, and smiled. "I hope Giovanni could forgive me..."

"Um...if you don't mind my asking," she said, figuring she might as well get some real information, "what _about_ him...?"

"Since disbanding Team Rocket three years ago, he's been missing," he said. "I'm sure he's been waiting for the right time for our revival."

Suddenly he pinched her cheek and laughed.

"Losing to you won't change the fact that you can't get to the transmitter!" he said, and practically skipped out of the room.

"Whatever," she said to the empty air.

She was feeling sort of tired and bored, and her face stung where he hadn't been able to resist pinching her, and she peered into one of the boxes on the table, but the papers in the folders were full of words and figures that didn't mean anything to her. Probably they were something dull and utilitarian like payroll or something.

She sighed, and sat down, wondering what she should do now. Looking for Lance seemed to make the most sense, but she didn't know where exactly to look; maybe he would find his way there on his own?

"Hello!"

She jumped, and looked around, scrambling to her feet. "Hello?" she said.

Silence for several seconds. Then, "Hello!"

It was the murkrow. She walked over to the cage and looked at it. "Hello," she said.

It hopped on its perch and looked at her, its head cocked to one side.

"Hello," she said again.

It opened its wings slightly and said, "Hello!"

She smiled, and went to her handbag for the Ziploc bag of walnuts she was using as reinforcers for Snoops. She dropped one into the cage, and the murkrow hopped down and ate it.

"Hello!"

"Hello," she said back. She couldn't help but smile. Honchkrows got a bad rap sometimes in popular mythology, but she thought they were very smart.

It vocalized indistinctly and then said, "What's up!"

"Oh, you say more than one thing!" she said, getting out another walnut. "What's up?"

It looked at her.

She tried again: "What's up?"

Again it opened its wings slightly and said, "What's up! What's up!"

She dropped the walnut in, and it ate it. "Can you say anything else?" she asked. "How about...nevermore? Can you say 'nevermore'?"

It made a little noise and said, "Hello!"

"Hello," she said.

"Hello!"

"Good! What's up?"

"What's up!" it said. "What's up!"

"Nevermore!"

"Giovanni!"

She actually gasped. It sounded just like Petrel.

It looked at her, its nictitating membrane closing and opening like a camera shutter.

"Giovanni," she said. "Giovanni."

It blinked again, and then opened its wings and said, "Giovanni!"

"Good!" she said, giving it a walnut.

Lance would be pleased with that, wouldn't he? Well, she couldn't carry the entire cage upstairs to the transmitter room; she began picking up poké balls from the shelves, weighing them in her hand until she found one that was empty.

On her way back to the transmitter she was keeping an eye out for Lance when somebody said, "Excuse me!"

Delilah turned and saw a woman with red hair hurrying up to her with a man in a Rocket uniform.

"We can't—"

Delilah's handbag buzzed disruptively. "Oh, sorry," she said, taking out her Pokégear. She was surprised to even get a signal, and she looked at it to see Irwin's name.

The woman drew a poké ball and made some sentences with her mouth, but they washed over her meaninglessly as she said, "Hello?"

Suddenly Lance appeared, also making sentences, and he and the woman interfaced intensely.

"Hello?" she repeated. "Irwin?"

There was a lot of fumbling on the other end and then Irwin said, "Hi, Delilah? Sorry! I had my phone in my pocket, and I just sat on it wrong, I guess, haha!"

"Ahah," she said, suddenly very irritated as Lance expanded a poké ball.

"Well, since I've got you here, are you watching TV?"

"No, I'm talking to you on the phone."

He laughed, misinterpreting her bitchiness as a joke. "I mean, do you have the TV on?"

"No, I have a dress on."

"Well, you should turn on a TV, and watch the news."

"The news?" she asked, wondering how he could be so obliviously good-natured when she was so obviously aggravated. "Why would I want to watch the news? I just saw it last week."

"Delilah, you're impossible," he said, and she could just _tell_ he was smiling, that...ninny.

"Irwin, I have to say, this is really not that great of a time..."

"Oh? What are you doing?" he asked conversationally.

"It's hard to explain but I'll call you back okay," she said, and hung up just in time to get involved in a double battle. Delilah didn't really like double battles, but of course they won, because after all Lance Siegfried was _LANCE SIEGFRIED_.

"You really are strong," said the woman when they were done. "But that's fine. It doesn't matter what happens to this place now..."

Lance told them off like the hero of a romance novel and they vanished mysteriously.

"Now, about this room," he said. "We still have to find Petrel..."

"Oh, I found him," said Delilah. She told him what had happened and released the murkrow from the poké ball.

"How convenient," he said.

"I know, right? It's like a puzzle in a LucasArts adventure game or something." She let the murkrow perch on her arm and she said, "Look, watch. Hello!"

It opened its wings and said, "Hello! Hello!"

"Good job!" she said, giving it a walnut. "What's up?"

"What's up!"

Lance smiled and said, "That's cute, but..."

"Yeah, I know, I'll get on with it. Giovanni!"

"Giovanni! Hello!"

There was a clicking sound, and she and Lance looked at the door.

"I think it unlocked," he said.

As soon as he opened the door, the murkrow leapt off of Delilah's arm and flew away back down the hallway. "Ouch!" she said, touching her arm where it had scratched her.

"You better clean that," said Lance. "Who knows what's on its feet." He told her potions were okay for humans, and he sprayed one once on the scratch. It stung a little, and she inhaled sharply, and put a Band-Aid on it.

They went inside the transmitter room and Delilah immediately got a weird, unsettled feeling in her digestive system or something. There was a big machine of some kind, with three electrodes on each side hooked up to it.

"We can't hear it," said Lance. "But do you feel that?"

"Yeah."

"Imagine how much worse it is for, like, a snake, or something."

"Well, just look at the electrodes...no wonder they're going insane..."

He examined the machine for a few minutes. "I don't know if there's a switch," he said. "If there is, it's hidden or something." He bit his lip and looked around. "If we battle the electrodes," he said, "they should get tired enough to stop...no, you know, I'm going to make some calls. That's too dangerous, with the electricity. We can get specialists in here..."

So that was an extremely anticlimactic way for this adventure to end. Lance told her he would pay her back for her "help", but at that point she had stopped caring. She went back to the pokémon center and collapsed into bed.


	6. XOffender

_Hi there, I thought I would take a minute just to clear something up. Nobody's asked about it so maybe it's not an issue, but I thought I would clarify anyway that I've made Johto into a rather urban setting. The games are vague enough that you can pretty much do whatever you want with them, yet it seems as though when I read fanfiction (which is admittedly not often) it's always in some crazy rural jungle thing. I just thought I'd explain the way I envision this working in a city, just in case it isn't clear: I figure you go to the gym every day, like going to work or school, and you can train or you can battle (which is where you make money). So no camping. I like animals and I like nature but I also like flush toilets and not having allergic reactions to a deluge of mosquito bites. Thanks to everyone who has read, reviewed, favorited, etc._

**06 X-Offender**

Delilah was pretty sure she was a criminal mastermind. She had paid to get on the trolley only once, having purchased a day pass for five dollars, but nobody had asked to see it. There were plenty of signs on the trolley and at the trolley stations saying things like "All Passengers Must Have Tickets", but there seemed to be nobody making sure that they did.

Only once had somebody asked to see her ticket, when she was using the trolley with Whitney, who also never bought a ticket. Delilah had shown him her months-old day pass, but Whitney apparently cleaned out her handbags more often than Delilah did because she "couldn't find it" and so they were told to get off at the next stop (which happened to be their stop anyway, so it was no great loss).

After this experience, Delilah kept her now almost-a-year-old day pass in her wallet, but if security personnel got on the trolley, she always got off and got back on in a different car.

Such was the case one spring day as she was on her merry freeloading way to the Goldenrod pokémon center, as she was planning to go home for Easter after winning her seventh badge in Mahogany. An official-looking man with a walky-talky got on, so she got off, and decided to wait for the next trolley, because all the cars looked crowded.

She was still continuing to see men (and occasionally women) in Team Rocket uniforms around; how they managed to get around without being questioned she did not know, except perhaps that nobody believed that Team Rocket was back, or that just wearing a uniform wasn't grounds for anything.

One of them was sitting on the black bench by the trolley schedule. She sat down next to him and out of the side of his mouth he asked her, "Who are you, a newcomer?"

"What?"

He glanced around surreptitiously and leaned in. "We've run out of uniforms," he told her under his breath, not looking at her. "One of my guys is going to get more. The studio is just around the corner."

Delilah hated not knowing what people were talking about. It made her feel stupid. "What do you mean?" she asked, assuming he had a good reason for talking to her.

"Just down the corner," he said, nodding to the street. "You'll know it, it looks like it's closed."

She blinked. "The photo studio?"

"Yeah," he said, nodding. "Hurry up, you better go, now."

"Okay...thanks," she said, standing up.

It must be Lance, she figured, as she made her way to the studio where Keanna Sherman had picked up her pokémon's photos. Lance Siegfried must have been in town, and looking for her. She was so expecting to see him when she got to the studio that she was sort of speechless when he wasn't there, and didn't know what to say to the man who was.

"Um..."

He smiled. "Are you a newcomer, too?" he asked sympathetically. "We had to recruit new members, and then we ran out of uniforms..." He rolled his eyes and sighed, walking to a rack of black uniforms. "Since you're here, why don't you change as well?"

Maybe Lance would show up later. In the meantime, she figured she would just go along with this; maybe he wanted her undercover. The man asked for her dress size and gave her a uniform, which she obligingly changed into in another room.

"Look at you! Pretty good," he said when she was done. "Oh, but don't scare people walking around like that, okay?"

"Oh, right," she said, and put her coat back on. After all, she didn't want people thinking she really was in Team Rocket.

"So, are you headed to the NBC Tower?" he asked her.

"Is that where I should go?"

"I don't know—where were you told to go?"

"I was not told _anything_," she said.

He rolled his eyes. "Typical," he scoffed. "This whole thing is so disorganized, it's ridiculous. I can't wait until we get some real leadership again. I'm sure if you go to the NBC building you'll get some instructions. You know where it is, right?"

"Yeah, by the mall?"

"Right. Cross your fingers!"

She laughed as she left the studio. Hopefully that was where Lance was. She should have given him her Pokégear number in Mahogany, then she would know what was going on...

She took the trolley to the Civic Centre stop and walked into the NBC building. Snoops walked along cautiously next to her. She was about to head up the staircase when she bumped into something hard.

"Oh, excuse me," she giggled in embarrassment as she took a step back from the large black man. She had another go at the staircase, this time the half of it that wasn't blocked by him, but again she bumped into the Rocket who had apparently shifted his position accordingly.

"Only Team Rocket through here," he said.

"Oh! Right," she said, and took off her coat.

He laughed. "You must be new," he said, stepping aside. "You look pretty good in the Team Rocket uniform! Go on ahead."

"Thanks—"

"Delilah?"

She turned. It was Adam.

"What are you doing?"

"Umm," she said, because she wasn't really sure.

Suddenly he frowned enormously and began to stalk over to her. "Are you kidding with this?" he demanded, gesturing to her. "What, you think joining them is going to help you get stronger?"

"Well, I—"

"That's stupid!" he almost shouted. "Take this off!" He grabbed the puffed shoulder of the uniform and pulled on it.

"Hey—!"

The security guard pulled Adam away from her. "Mr Harlow, I don't know what your problem is with this girl, but you have no business—"

"Get your hands off me!" Adam snarled, struggling out of his grip.

Adam glared at her, and she and the guard stood there awkwardly for a minute. She adjusted the uniform, fixing the hemline where her slip was showing.

"I want to talk to you," said Adam, but it kind of sounded more like he wanted to have rude and nasty sexual relations with her.

"You don't have to," the security guard told her.

"That's okay," she said.

"Give me a holler if he gives you any more trouble, okay?"

"All right, thank you," she said, following Adam up the stairs. He was wearing probably the tightest pants she had ever seen, so it wasn't too arduous a task.

Upstairs were a bunch of cubicles with computers; Adam pulled her into an empty one and she told him what she was doing. "So you're trying to be sneaky?" He scoffed. "How...meek! You should be confident enough that you don't need to do that. What are you trying to hide?"

"Well, I thought that Lance Siegfried had this set up so that—"

He scowled. "Is he here?"

"I don't know, I _thought_ he was..."

"I want a rematch with him," he said. "And then I'll battle you."

"Uhhh...okay."

Adam told her he'd found out that Team Rocket had abducted the radio tower's director, after he made her change out of the uniform.

"Hey, hey! Keep out of—oh...!"

The two men stopped abruptly when they saw Adam. One was very muscular and the other was short and had kind of a lumpy face.

"Mr Harlow!" fluttered the short one. "Gosh, I...! I didn't know you were here!"

"We're so sorry for bothering you!" drooled the muscular one slavishly. "Is there anything we can do for you?"

"That's all right," said Adam.

"Gosh! I can't believe I'm meeting you! You really are a good-looking guy—if you don't mind me saying so," he added hastily.

"No, I don't mind, it's fine."

"I wanted to be a male model, when I was a kid," said the short one wistfully. "My mother said I never could, she said I didn't have the looks for it, and anyway it wasn't normal for a boy to want to be a model."

"Oh, psh," said Adam. "Normal is only what you know."

He looked comforted by this.

"Besides," said the muscular one. "You've got a very unique face. There's nothing wrong with that."

"No? You think so?"

He grunted tenderly. There was a gentle moment between them.

Once they went back to work Delilah remarked to Adam, "I didn't realize you had so much sway with members of Team Rocket..."

He shrugged. "I'm the boss' son," he said. "Not much more..."

He was the boss' very good-looking, very rich, very scary son. Delilah already thought he was a very intimidating individual; she couldn't imagine how frightening it must have been to have him be her boss' child. "So...about your dad..."

He sneered. "What about him?"

"Uh...is he going to...reband Team Rocket?"

"Team Rocket never broke up."

"Really?"

"Yeah. That's just cover-up. They're still going."

"Huh. Wow," she said, thinking what an elaborate ruse had been constructed on her adventures with Team Rocket.

"Here, give me your Pokégear number, just in case," he said, taking his phone out of his pocket.

"Okay," she said, opening her Pokégear to check the number.

"That's cute," he said, pointing to it. It was pink and white.

"Oh, thanks," she said, and read the number to him.

"I had a Pokégear, once," he said.

"Yeah? What happened to it?"

He paused. "It fell in a garbage bin I was bending over and I threw up pomegranate margaritas on it," he said.

There was a beat, and then she laughed.

"I tried to call them and have it replaced," he said. "I just never got round to it, really...'cos I was trying to find the number, or something, while I was on the phone with a customer service person. I was looking under the seat of my car in the car park and this bloke comes up, to get in the next space, and honked his horn at me, but he well had enough room, so I didn't move. So then he got out of the car, and came up to me, and said 'excuse me', and then went back to the car. So I moved, but he didn't get in the space so I went back to what I was doing. Then he got out again and came up to me and he said, 'Excuse me...again,' and so I moved again. He called out to me, 'Move your door, I don't want to hit it,' and I said, 'It's okay, there's plenty of room.'

"'Move it.'

"'You're fine.'

"'I don't want to hit your car.'

"So then I got angry and sort of yelled at him, like, 'Look, clever trousers, I don't suppose you could have gone round the other way,' and he got out of the car, and dropped his keys and his sunglasses on the ground, and just started screaming at me. So I just stuck up my fingers at him, 'cos I was still on the phone. So he bent over to pick up his stuff, and he called me a 'privileged piece of shit'. So I turned around and stomped on his sunglasses. So he whacked mine off my face, but I caught them before they hit the ground, 'cos they were Versace. Then he knocked my hat off my head, so I hit him, and hung up on the customer service rep. Then he, like, _butted chests_ with me, and he said, 'Back off, you son of a bitch!' and I pushed him and said, 'Fuck you!' and he kept screaming at me. So I just shouted, 'GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY FACE!' and he went away."

She laughed again, even though (or perhaps because) she didn't think he was trying to be funny. "So what about your Pokégear?"

"Oh, yeah...I called them back and I was like, oh, it isn't working, who knows why?"

Delilah still didn't really know what was going on completely; they burst in on Petrel, who said, "Hey, who—oh, Mr Harlow! And—you again!"

"Hi," said Delilah. Immediately she realized that was probably a dumb thing to say.

"This time I won't hold back," he said, expanding a poké ball.

She won anyway.

"Okay, okay. I'll tell you where he is," he said, coming closer to them. "Listen carefully: we stashed the Director in the underground warehouse." He gestured to himself. "I am a nice guy. I'll give you the key. Take it with gratitude," he said, handing Adam a key and patting Delilah's cheek.

"Well...thanks, I guess," she said. Adam's presence certainly made things easy.

As she and Adam left the building he asked her, "So where do you think Lance is?"

"I don't know. I'm starting to think he's not actually involved at all."

"Well...what made you think he was?"

"Well, I was at the trolley station today, and this guy basically told me to go get that Team Rocket uniform, and I figured it must have been Lance's doing, because he was the one who got me doing the Team Rocket thing last time...but now I'm thinking maybe I just accidentally gave some kind of secret signal, or something."

"Well, he never showed up," he said, as if it were her fault.

"Yeah, obviously..."

He stopped, and looked at her for a minute. "I was planning to beat you after Lance," he said, removing a poké ball from his belt, "but since you are here..."

She won anyway.

He looked extremely upset. "Why do I lose?" he asked. "My pokémon are strong. I'm great at battling. So why do I lose?"

It didn't seem like he was really talking to her. She didn't know what to say anyway, so she didn't say anything.

"I don't understand it," he said. "What is keeping me from winning?"

He stood in front of her, staring at the spot where their pokémon had been. Then he sighed.

"I just don't get it," he said. "It's getting late...I guess we can continue this tomorrow..."

On the corner of the sidewalk was a homeless woman in a wheelchair. "Mey shin derm agh?" she asked.

Adam frowned in incomprehension. "Huh?" he asked her.

Even before they had gotten across the street, Delilah burst out laughing. "I can't believe you said that," she said.

"What? I didn't understand her."

"Probably because she's homeless or schizophrenic or raised by mightyenas or something," she said. "Your presence doesn't command people to speak coherently..."

"Shut up," he said, but it sounded like he was trying not to laugh.

"Don't you speak bum? I mean, tramp? Or are they vagrants to you? Or vagabonds?"

"Commoners," he said, and she laughed.

The next morning she was woken up by the awful sound of a phone ringing. "Hello?" she asked, but she wasn't sure if it actually came out right. She cleared her throat and repeated, "Hello?"

"Hi, Delilah, I'm on my way to the pokémon center," said Adam. "When can you be ready?"

"Oh. Ummm...well, I'm still in bed..."

"I'm on Park Boulevard," he said. "I'll wait downstairs for you."

"Well, then I guess I'll see you then," she said.

"Right, cheers," he said cheerlessly and hung up.

She immediately fell back asleep.

"Delilah."

She jerked awake and saw Adam coming into her room.

"It's noon," he said. "I've been waiting downstairs for an hour."

Groaning, she sat up. "How did you get in here?"

"I rented that bed," he said, pointing to the other bed in the room.

She sighed, rubbing her eyes. Adam complained at her for a minute and then went back downstairs to wait for her in the cafeteria.

After she got dressed she went downstairs, and saw Irwin handing his pokémon to the nurse. "Hi, Delilah!" he said when she called his name. "I didn't know you were back in Goldenrod."

"Yeah, well, I'm going home, for Easter," she said. "I just ended up hanging around here for a couple days..."

"What are you doing today? Are you busy, do you want to hang out?"

How could she put this? "Hmm, well, I don't know," she said. "I was going to hang out with Adam Harlow—"

Irwin suddenly freaked out. "_Adam Harlow_, Delilah? ADAM?"

"Well..."

"What, was Hitler busy?"

"Meow!" She laughed. "That was mean."

"Why would you want to hang out with him? Wouldn't you rather hang out with me? I'm your friend. Just tell him you want to hang out with me."

"Are you kidding? What do you expect me to do? Appeal to his _generosity_?"

Actually she was sort of relieved by this. If Irwin had clashed with Adam in the past, she wouldn't have to come up with an excuse about why she couldn't invite him along to hang out with them because he wouldn't want to anyway.

"Oh, look," she said.

"Hey!" said Irwin. "You just found fifty bucks!"

"Yeah...now I have to find Adam."

"Why?"

"Oh, he's always losing these things."

Irwin looked doubtful. "What kind of a dumbass is he?"

"Oh, a loving and gentle one...he uses these for bookmarks."

"What?"

"He always has a few of these lying around."

"Why doesn't he just use one dollar bills?"

Delilah laughed. "Adam rarely bothers to carry anything smaller than a twenty," she said.

When they found Adam sitting in the cafeteria, he looked at his book. "Oh, now I've lost my place," he said, taking the money. "Hey ho. They must be waxing these before distribution."

Irwin looked markedly skeptical. "Why don't you use hundreds?" he asked sarcastically.

"Oh, I do," said Adam, either missing the joke or ignoring it. "I just dip into my pockets and use whatever is floating round..."

Delilah went to the bathroom, and when she came back Irwin was gone. When she asked Adam where he went, he just shrugged, so she didn't bother. "So...what are we going to do today?" she asked in the car.

He didn't say anything.

"Adam?"

"I'm thinking," he snapped.

"For you, I find that a bit suspicious..."

"Shut up, Delilah."

She shut up. For a second, she had to wonder why. What would he do if she didn't? If she were a boy, maybe he would hit her. Although if she were honest with herself, they probably wouldn't spend nearly as much time together if she were a boy. Adam kept her on hand because of her pokémon, but it was probably a lot easier for him to have her around because she was pretty. Other than that, he basically couldn't stand her.

Of course, there was also Delilah's side to consider—she would be infinitely less willing to interact with Adam at all if she weren't attracted to him. Of course, if she had been born a boy, maybe her entire personality would be different, or maybe she would even be gay, too. Or what if Adam were a girl? Would he be any different without an SRY gene? Would it be easier for them to be friends if he had been Eve rather than Adam? Or if she had been Samson instead of Delilah?

In the end, she supposed it didn't matter. He was a boy and she was a girl and Avril Lavigne wondered if their respective genders could be given more exposition. Delilah did have to wonder why Adam had never made more overt sexual advances on her. She knew he was attracted to her and she knew he knew she was attracted to him. It wasn't like she had any idea what she would do if he did, but she had to admit to some disappointment that her sex appeal was overwhelmed by his dislike of her.

"Oh, fuck cars, I hate driving," said Adam as the back tires went over the curb outside a Petco, where they had come to run a few errands. There was a carousel nearby and Delilah immediately wanted to go on it.

She sat and watched him critique his reflection and fix his hair for a few minutes. "You certainly take good care of yourself," she said.

"Well, my father always told me to attend to my natural resources," he said absently. "Of course, in a recession, most people try to conserve, when really the thing to do is expend to create jobs."

"Well...some people just don't have resources," she said. "Some people don't have the opportunity to make that decision."

"Sure, yes, the economy is in a bad way the world over," said Adam. "It affects everyone."

She laughed. "Lucky for you, it's fashionable to look poor—no wonder you're in the Mercedes, and not the limousine!"

"Oh, shut up."

"I bet when you were a kid your allowance was pegged to the gold standard."

He didn't say anything.

"Maybe it still is."

"Shut up."

Maybe she was just too prideful, and upset that he had slept with so many girls but not her—surely she made the cut! She was a good-looking girl, and didn't really believe that Adam would sleep with a girl because of her personality. He hated everybody! Did he just hate her that much, that it didn't matter what she looked like? She was only slightly disenchanted with herself when she realized that she didn't care that he hated her and instead was just bitter that her considerable feminine charms wouldn't sway him. But was that what she really wanted anyway? Did she want to have sex with Adam or did she just want Adam to want to have sex with her?

Sex and relationships had never been of great concern or interest to her; when she met and interacted with people, she rarely, if ever, thought of them in sexual or romantic ways. She had never had a crush on anybody, something that had confounded her middle school peers, who refused to believe her, and she hardly ever even thought boys were good-looking in real life, nine times out of ten only being attracted to actors and their ilk; but even then she thought it was sort of creepy, because after all people like Brad Pitt and David Beckham and Robert Pattinson were all still real people with their own lives and it seemed somehow presumptuous.

But then, Adam was in technical terms a male model, having appeared in more than one fashion editorial; she just happened to have met him. Was it any different? In fact, was it worse? The only reason he was famous in the first place was because he was sexy; his looks and his libido were the entire basis of his celebrity. Did that cheapen her interest in him? Was it something so obvious and universal that it couldn't even be acknowledged?

Maybe Delilah really was the least romantic individual on the face of the planet. Perhaps this was part of why she was attracted to Adam: because he did not make a big production about it. In that way it never seemed patronizing, because he did not pretend that sex was anything but sex, free of woo and flattery and the more flowery emotions that Delilah thought were somehow deceptive. Was romance the opposite of reality, the way romanticism was the opposite of realism?

When they left the store with their purchases Adam lit a cigarette and Delilah asked him, "Hey, so, do you want to go on the merry-go-round."

He looked at it. "The carousel? All right. Yeah, I want that horse," he said, pointing to a rapidash on the outside of the carousel whose mane and tail had been carved to fly magnificently behind it.

As they stepped up to the platform, a kid carrying a blue balloon got onto Adam's horse.

Adam frowned, and pressed the end of his cigarette to the balloon.

The kid jumped at the sudden noise and looked up, only to find Adam looking in the other direction and smoking, all nonchalant.

Adam had to settle for a less magnificent horse, which he sat on as if it were a Lipizzaner stallion performing classical dressage. When the ride finished, the kid came up to Adam, still dragging the deflated balloon on the end of the string, and said bluntly, "My mom says smoking is the worst thing to kill you."

Adam's lip curled in revulsion.

"Were you never told not to talk to strange men?" he sneered.

The kid looked at him blankly.

"Look," said Adam. "_I'm_ a strange man. Sod off."

He laughed at Adam's accent.

Scowling, Adam dragged him to the lady and asked her, "Is this yours, missus?"

"Oh, where have you been! Yes, isn't he a naughty little darling?"

"He can be a naughty little darling with somebody else," snapped Adam, turning sharply to walk away.

"Humph!" said the lady. "I hope a swarm of beedrills builds a nest in your stupid Mohawk, you obnoxious, child-hating jerk!"

"Beedrills I'd welcome," he muttered in the car, "if it would get bloody people out of my hair..."


	7. I Hate You

**07 I Hate You**

When he stopped the car downtown he said, "Look, there's Irwin."

"Oh?" asked Delilah. "Are we there?"

"No, we're here," he said, taking off his seatbelt. "I think I'll apologise to Irwin for the things I said to him."

"Oh. That's nice of you."

"Well, he's not bad."

"Well! This is a completely unexpected streak of human decency."

"I've never apologised to someone before," he said, getting out of the car. "But I'll try anything once..."

He called Irwin's name, parading up to him like a bird in mating season, and Irwin stopped walking and turned around.

"What do you want?" he asked.

"I want to apologise for losing my cool."

Irwin sighed. "Well, to be honest, I was thinking of doing the same," he said. "It was stupid to freak out over such a dumb thing."

"I can understand you freaking out, Irwin," said Adam generously. "After all, Delilah _did_ turn you down for her plans with me."

Irwin bristled. "Well, I can't help it if she doesn't have any _taste_," he said, "but _I_ started the scrap, Adam. I shouldn't have said that if your golbat bit you it would die of alcohol poisoning."

"You didn't start it, matey!" Adam insisted. "I did! I said you dress like an accident going somewhere to happen; that's what got it going."

"No, it didn't! You went apeshit when I said if you had to make a speech on what you know about pokémon, the silence would be unbearable!"

"It's not true and you know it! You carried on like a wild man when I said you part your hair on the side because your mind is unbalanced!"

"Look, asshole! Don't tell _me_ who started the scrap because _I_ did!"

"Like hell you did! I distinctly remember starting it so don't be such a pertinacious...piloswine!"

"_Piloswine_? Who are you calling piloswine, you charmeleon hothead FREAK?"

Adam began to rip off his Yves Saint Laurent hacking jacket. "And to think _I_ was going to apologise to _you_! Well, I don't care who started it! I meant every word I said, CREEP!"

"Yeah, well, me too, JERK!"

Delilah scrambled out of the car, calling, "Hey!"

"Well, I feel better now, Delilah," Adam panted as both of them stood there roughed up and breathing hard. "Now neither of us is fit to be seen with you."

"What a very mature conclusion," she said.

"Don't talk to me like that!" said Adam.

"Oh, don't act like you're blameless, Adam! This is the dumbest thing I've ever seen! How infantile! I know it would be too much to expect sophomoric, and I wouldn't even presume asking for juvenile, but couldn't we move on to childish, at least?"

"Is three o'clock behind the playground childish enough?" asked Irwin.

"It would certainly elicit a boyish giggle from these dewy young lips," Adam snarled.

"That's a laugh," Delilah scoffed. "Just say the word, and I'll quietly remove myself so you can explore your relationship privately."

Irwin looked like he was going to throw up; Adam wore his usual "have-a-nice-day" look.

"I'm sure there's a way to settle this," said Irwin.

"There is," said Adam, taking Delilah by the elbow. "Delilah comes with me, and you go home."

She shook him off. "Stop being such an overwhelming jerk, Adam!"

"Yeah!" added Irwin.

"And Irwin, stop being such an insufferable chump! Nobody has the right of way here! Maybe I'll just go home!"

Adam frowned. "No, you won't," he sneered.

Delilah was suddenly very angry. "Adam, there's no reason why I should do whatever you tell me!" she said. "Maybe I don't feel like it."

He stood there seething, apparently struggling for several moments to find words that would convey the richness and complexity of emotion he was undoubtedly feeling. Finally he settled on, "Bollocks!"

"Why? You're the one who asked me. I would be perfectly content staying home."

"Delilah sure can play you for a patsy," said Irwin smugly.

"She does not," Adam snapped truthfully.

"Face it, Adam: all that matters to you is a pretty face."

"That's absurd," said Adam, gesturing forcefully at Delilah. "Would I ignore that sort of body?"

"What an awful thing to say!"

They started to bicker again and Delilah tried to think. Technically speaking, going with Adam was the better option, considering it was in fact for a good cause, but that would be rewarding his undesirable behavior. There had to be a punishing consequence she could apply; she really didn't want to use the Least Reinforcing Stimulus, which would probably be leaving him to go by himself.

The problem was that she didn't really have a lot of power over Adam or his decisions; all she had to work with was the fact that he wanted her to come with him to the underground warehouse—she had proven yesterday that she was the superior trainer, but how important was it to him that she come?

She wanted to punish his behavior, which, as in pokémon training, could be done in two ways: removing a desirable consequence, or applying an undesirable one. A desirable consequence could be Delilah going with him; however, this could stray into LRS territory if he eventually decided he didn't need her after all.

She couldn't use extinction.

She couldn't use negative reinforcement.

She had to add an undesirable consequence.

"Okay, cut it out," said Delilah, surprised when they actually obeyed. "There's only one thing to do here."

"What's that?" asked Irwin, sounding unconvinced that she had found a solution.

"Well, to summarize the issue," said Delilah, "the problem is that you both want the same thing. Right?"

"This is stupid!" raged Adam. "I asked you first! There is no problem!"

"Well, you're _not_ endearing yourself to me," said Delilah. "Maybe I'm changing my mind."

"Oh, really?" he fumed, hands on hips. "Are you going to say no to me so you can say yes to him?"

"I think you're both stupid," she clarified. "I would say no to both of you, but I don't think that's bad enough, so I'm not going to."

"So what are you going to do?"

"I'm going to say yes to both of you," she said, glaring meaningfully at him. "We'll all hang out together."

"You're not serious," said Adam.

"We'll go to a movie or something."

"But—"

"No, Adam!" she said, getting mad again. "Either we hang out, including Irwin, or I'm never going to go anywhere with you again."

Adam boiled in silence for a few seconds; his loss to her the previous day must have affected his confidence more than she thought, because he conceded.

"But we have to share equally," said Irwin, eyeing Adam mistrustfully. "You can't hog her."

"But that goes for you too, Irwin," Delilah added quickly. "You can't hog me either."

Adam laughed venomously. "Fine," he agreed. "We don't try to monopolise Delilah, and Delilah doesn't play favourites."

"That won't be hard," she scoffed. "Okay, so are we all okay? Does everyone agree that this is the best situation?"

"Gee," said Irwin sarcastically. "Pinch me, I must be dreaming."

With a loud "ouch" he jumped, and then glared at Adam.

"I wasn't talking to _you_," he groused, one hand clapped protectively over his bottom.

"Simple mistake," said Adam, smiling sweetly.

"_You're_ a simple mistake," Irwin retorted unskillfully. When he saw Adam's car he snorted, "What, no Rolls Royce?"

"I had one, but I had to give it up," said Adam. "The ashtrays were full."

Irwin looked scandalized. "And they couldn't have been cleaned out?"

"Well, I suppose they could have, but I don't know anyone who does that sort of work," said Adam, with the faintest hint of a smile.

They went to the Pacific Theatre and struggled to pick a movie. Finally they settled on _Kresblain: the Merry Magician_ which was in 3-D.

"Two for 6:15," said Adam to the box office lady, getting out some money.

"No!" Irwin insisted, pushing in next to him. "Only give him one! I'm paying for her!"

"No, you're not!" Adam laughed in disbelief. "You weren't even meant to have come!"

"But she invited me, didn't she, stupid? Looks like she really values her time alone with you, jerkoff!"

Adam's face turned stormy. "How dare you?" he asked. "How DARE you! Right, you microorchidistic prolefeed—"

"Oh, shut up, you guys," Delilah interjected. "It's not a big deal, I'll pay for myself. It really _doesn't matter_."

As they got their tickets and their 3-D glasses she was starting to think maybe this wasn't a good idea after all. Inside Irwin simperingly asked her if she wanted popcorn or something, and Adam cracked under the mighty load of patience.

"You are NOT buying her popcorn!" he howled exasperatedly.

"I don't need your permission, cockbag!" Irwin screeched. Then he did the daring thing and pushed him.

Adam, of course, pushed back.

"Oh my God, I am _so_ over this," said Delilah, putting up her hands and walking to the theater. "You solve this by killing each other, and I'll get seats."

As she entered the screen room, she heard an employee coming to break them up; she sighed, and looked around. The theater was extremely crowded. She wasn't sure if there were three empty seats together anywhere. To the side she could see two, and another far away, front and center, and that was all. Apparently they had gotten the very last tickets for that show.

The lights dimmed, and the previews began; Adam and Irwin soon came in.

"I bought you popcorn," said Irwin triumphantly, handing it to her.

Adam shoved a drink at her; it seemed they had been driven to compromise. "Why didn't you save seats?" he demanded.

"I can't find three together," she whispered. "There are two over there, and one up there..."

"Well, Irwin," said Adam, taking Delilah by the wrist, "you'll have just a gorgeous view of the screen." Adam, who had not bothered to remove his sunglasses, seemed to be planning on convincing Delilah to abandon Irwin there and go to the underground warehouse.

Irwin, unaware of this, naturally assumed otherwise. "Oh, a gorgeous view—I'm so sure! Why should you sit together?"

"Shh! You guys!"

The lights dimmed again as the previews ended.

"You're a cheating pirate!" Irwin decibelled. "Your word isn't worth shit!"

"Oh, much less!" Adam agreed gleefully. "Shit is high these days!"

They started fighting.

"Shhh! Be quiet! Oh, whatever! You guys can sit next to each other, I'm just going to sit by myself!"

After the movie ended they stood outside; Adam looked very bored and Delilah and Irwin hung there awkwardly.

She ventured to ask, "Well...are you hungry, or something?"

"Nah," said Irwin. "I'm good."

"I'm not," said Adam.

"Yeah, you're the worst," said Delilah; Adam looked like he was about to smile until Irwin laughed very loudly.

"Well, I'm not hungry, either," he grumbled.

"You know what your problem is, Adam," said Irwin foolishly. "You have no sense of humor."

"No sense of humour!" Adam looked like an arbok, raising its body off the ground and spreading its hood. "You'd be shocked what I could do to your funny bone!"

Delilah ignored them, continuing past them toward Adam's parking spot. There was no further conversation from them, so she figured they had given up and followed her, until she heard Adam gasping and swearing. More surprised than anything, she turned around, but although Irwin looked amused, it wasn't his doing: Adam had walked into a lamppost.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"Oh, it's all your fault," he spat angrily, clutching his shoulder.

"_My_ fault?" asked Delilah.

"_Her_ fault?" asked Irwin.

"Nobody told you to wear that dress," he snarled.

"Nobody told you to look," snapped Irwin.

"Oh, shut up, diphthong! You practically tripped over your panting tongue!"

"I certainly did not, and I'll never do it again! Not hardly!"

"That's a double negative, Irwin; but then again, so are you."

Irwin poked Adam in the chest. "You know what, Adam? All the money in the world couldn't buy you a personality!"

Adam raised an eyebrow. "Maybe not," he said, slapping Irwin's hand away, "but it can certainly buy me better lines than that."

"Oh, yeah? Well—grrhaaaggh!" Irwin replied articulately, launching himself at Adam.

"Grrr!" Adam retorted with his usual cerebral wit, shoving him away.

"Frlughh!" answered Irwin as he cleverly shoved him back.

"Blzzrt!" Adam quipped brilliantly, pushing him in return.

"You guys, cut it out," said Delilah emotionlessly. "As charmed as I am by this eloquent persiflage, this was the worst idea I ever had."

Irwin tried to comfort her. "It's not your fault," he said.

"You're right," she agreed impassively. "You're just stupid idiots. How barbaric!"

"Yeah!" Irwin agreed with hypocritical contempt. "I feel like I'm in the olden days, fighting for your hand!"

Adam laughed harshly, grooming his eyebrows with his fingers in front of the movie theater's glass side doors. "I _hardly_ believe," he said, "that you're working up a sweat just for Delilah's _hand_."

Irwin looked shocked. "I can't believe you said that!" he exclaimed.

"Don't forget the good parts," said Adam, smiling languidly. Really it was no wonder that Adam didn't smile very much, because if he did it in public he probably would get arrested.

"Aren't you insulted, Delilah?"

"No, I'm extremely bored. You are both very annoying."

"Well, it's tradition for man to fight over woman," said Irwin.

Adam looked at him with skeptical pity. "You know," he said, "the Law of Averages isn't a _real_ law."

"Oh, yeah? Well, it's also tradition for the woman to comfort the loser. She never picks the winner, because he's a bully."

"You guys are making me really uncomfortable," said Delilah. "So can you please...just...not."

"Money just poisons the soul," said Irwin. "Rich people think they can run roughshod all over the world."

"Don't give me that 'right' and 'wrong' nonsense," Adam snapped. "You only get what you take in this world, and for the record I'd hardly call myself roughly shod. Should you go away empty-handed you have only yourself to blame."

"Why do you think Robin Hood stole from the rich?"

"Because the poor had nothing to take," Adam scoffed dismissively.

Irwin couldn't come up with a response to this. Delilah got into the backseat of the car so that she wouldn't be showing a seating preference, but Irwin ruined it by also getting into the back instead of sitting in the front with Adam.

"Turn here," said Irwin, directing Adam to his apartment. "And watch out for that pedestrian, Jesus Christ."

"If she's having a day like mine," said Adam, "striking her down would be an act of utmost humanity."

"You may have a lot of clouds, Adam," said Delilah, "but some of them are even lined with _gold_."

"Oh, who wants to hear about the weather right now," said Adam, pulling up to the sidewalk.

"But...you're English," said Irwin.

Adam turned around completely and stared at Irwin in a disgusted silence.

Irwin looked away and got out of the car. "I'll see you later, Delilah," he said.

"Bye," she said, trying not to laugh.

Adam watched him close the door. "Parting is such sweet sorrow, and that," he called out the window. "Cheerio, old fruit. If you teach me to brush my teeth, perhaps I can arrange an introduction the Queen!"

Irwin ignored him and started to walk around the front of the car.

Suddenly, the car lurched forward, and Delilah gasped loudly.

Adam laughed solemnly as Irwin jumped and scrambled for the sidewalk.

"Oh, my God!" Delilah exclaimed, her heart pounding. "You asshole!"

Adam sobered immediately. "I don't like him," he explained sternly.

"What the fuck!" said Delilah.

Adam drove away from the curb and sighed. "I really hope that Irwin doesn't represent the pinnacle of your love life," he said.

She sighed too as she began to develop an impressive new psychological issue. "It's not a big deal," she said.

"You don't think anything's a big deal."

"No, I don't," she admitted. "Here's some trivia for you, Adam: the earth rotates around its axis at 465 miles per second. At the same time, it orbits the sun at over a hundred miles per second. The whole Milky Way moves at hundreds of miles a second. The reason we don't get dizzy is because it is just so, so _big_ compared to us. So I'm not going to act like anyone should care about me or my problems, because I sure don't."

"Okay, I won't argue," he said. "But here's some trivia for you: space is a big place, bigger than any person can even comprehend. Even if you had a really fast rocket that was faster than anybody could conceivably build in the foreseeable future, you could travel around the universe, you'd see not a bloody speck of it. It's really, really huge, and probably nobody will ever see the whole thing. So you know what that means? Most of the universe is insignificant."

"Well, one part of the universe is not more significant than another just because Adam Harlow inhabits it."

"It is to me," he said. "And the part of the universe inhabited by Delilah Peerenboom is more significant to you than mine is." He looked back at her. "Do you want to sit in the front?"

With immature firmness she looked away from him out the window. "No."

In the underground warehouse there was a big sign that said, "NO ENTRY BEYOND THIS POINT." They entered anyway. Of course Adam would still expect her to do this. Well, then, FINE. She would do it, but she was going to be as annoying and pointless as she could. She would hang on him like a dead weight. And eventually he would realize he could have done the whole thing without her, and that going to the movies and waiting around with Irwin was a complete waste of time. That would show him. That would be the best.

Yeah.

"I'm thinking those doors will open for certain people," he said.

"I'm thinking...when does the next _Harry Potter_ movie come out," said Delilah.

He stared at her.

She smiled vacuously.

"I'm going to tell this chap to let us in," he said.

"Can you do that?"

He looked surprised. "Can I _do_ that?" he repeated.

"I asked you first," she said blankly.

He looked at her weirdly, and decided not to answer.

Eventually he got sick of it; after she made one of these bored, facetious comments to a Rocket, he grabbed her arm and pulled her struggling around a corner. He let go forcibly and she gave him a dirty look, holding her arm protectively.

"Delilah, you are being a complete fucking idiot," he growled.

Feeling stripped and inadequate as he glared down at her, she quickly looked away, wishing she could look him in the face without feeling inferior.

"You told me you'd do this. If you changed your mind, fucking _tell me_. Don't get passive-aggressive."

Every word he said made her angrier. He was no better than she was. There was nothing wrong with her. She didn't have to listen to him.

"I know you're angry with me," he continued. "Fine. I don't care. Be angry with me. The only person who cares is you."

"That's very funny coming from you," she said. "It takes a lot to make me mad, Adam. You're mad every time I talk to you. I have as much a right to anger as you do."

"Well, you know what, Delilah?" He crossed his arms. "If I'm such an egomaniac that you can't stand to be around me, there's nothing stopping you from going home. If you don't want to be here, then why are you here?"

She didn't know how to answer him, and it made her embarrassed and angry.

"Do you want to have sex with me?" he asked angrily. "Is that all you want? Because if that's the only reason you're here, we can do it right now and you can leave." He reached into his pocket and produced a condom.

She was so humiliated and her face was so hot that she thought she was going to start crying. She couldn't believe this was happening. She didn't want to be there. She didn't want to look at Adam or answer him or listen to him anymore.

"Well?" he said. "On the floor? Up against a wall? Whatever you want."

"Adam, who do you think you are?" She blinked furiously to staunch her tears, trembling with rage. "If you ever met somebody who treated you the way you treat other people, you would hate him and you would never shut up about it. I think I deserve to be in a bad mood."

"First of all, Delilah, you don't know anything about me. Second of all, you tolerated me earlier today; so it's okay for me to be a jerk, until I'm a jerk _to you_? That makes you just as entitled as I am."

"Adam—!"

"Enough lecturing! I've been lectured by the experts, and do you know? It has never done an ounce of good!"

He turned and began to stalk away. "OBVIOUSLY!" she shouted at him.

She ended up getting involved in a few pokémon matches with some familiar faces, like the redheaded woman and the man from Slowpoke Well, while Adam did whatever it was he needed to do, and then the final car ride was completely silent. Delilah sat in the front seat this time but did not look at Adam.

He pulled up in front of the pokémon center.

"Um," he said.

She opened the door and got out as fast as she could, slamming it behind her and marching up to the pokémon center without looking back. She wasn't even sure why she was so angry, so frustrated; she prayed that she had not gotten a roommate while she was gone, and then remembered that Adam had rented the other bed for the day, so she would be alone after all.

"Thank God!" she said out loud as she opened the door to her room.

Then she wiped off her lipstick so she wouldn't leave a stain as she smothered her face in her pillow and groaned as long as she could sustain it.

"...!"


	8. Kick the Bucket

**08 Kick the Bucket**

Blackthorn was a place where people took pokémon seriously. The gym leader, Clair Alexander, was the cousin of Lance Siegfried, pictures and standees of whom were everywhere: in the pokémon center, the gym, the Blackthorn Pioneer Museum, the California Mightyena Center.

Dragon-types were tough, and so was Clair, and it was generally recommended that trainers wait to challenge her until they had at least four badges; even then, challenging her was still a process, because a trainer had to take a written test before she would agree to battle.

And so, as a result, despite Blackthorn's non-bustling status, there were quite a lot of trainers at the gym, having caught snags in their badge-collecting either by failing the test or losing the match.

"Is Adam at the gym today?" asked Keanna Sherman the day before Delilah's badge match.

"No, not today," said Lydia Tracey, a slightly older woman who lived in Blackthorn. "I think he went home today."

"Really? Back to Kanto?"

"Oh, no, just back to where he and his parents are staying, in Olivine. I think he'll be back, 'cuz he didn't win a Rising Badge yet..."

Adam was training at the Blackthorn Gym too, and Delilah saw him sometimes. Sometimes he was mean to her and sometimes he wasn't.

She couldn't find it in herself to care.

"Well, anyway, it's good that he's not here," said Keanna, opening her bag. "My friend was in Kanto for a week, and he brought me back this magazine..."

_ "We know the devil is in him, but where in the devil is he?"_

_ This question was asked for weeks of professional toyboy __**Adam Harlow**__, 21, who seems to have absconded to the States with a new hairdo._

_ Photographed here for the first time in months, looking like death on a cracker with his signature red locks freshly shorn Mohican style, handsome hooligan Harlow was finally spotted with a sneasel at his heels, looking luxuriously unfriendly in the southern California sunshine. This couple of weasels proves a sightly enough pair that the soigné scoundrel remains recognisable even with sunglasses, a new haircut, and 5,500 kilometres between himself and his homeland._

_ It stands to reason that Adam, who infamously arrived late to the 2006 trial when his Croesus father __**Giovanni Harlow**__, 48, was accused of affiliations with a gangster empire, should make his own time entirely, appearing for the cameras only as his notorious temperament permits..._

"That's really not that bad," said Delilah. "Considering the kind of things they _could_ say about him..."

"I just thought it was funny," said Keanna. "I think these magazines are so funny..."

"I don't really get the point of this article," said Delilah, looking it over. "I mean, what is it reporting? I'm surprised they didn't make up a story for it. It must have been a very slow week..."

Lydia walked with Delilah back to the pokémon center, which wasn't very far (Delilah wasn't sure why more cities didn't have the gym closer to the pokémon center, since it seemed to make the most efficient logistical sense), and they continued to discuss (mostly trash-talk) Adam. "Well, you know how men are," Lydia said. "Their minds work differently, you know? 'Cuz men, they have to process things one at a time, you know, but women are a lot more flexible, and can do more things at once. They just think in a completely different way."

This struck Delilah as a rather provincial and remarkably stupid thing to say, the kind of thinking that made her hate romantic comedies. "Um," she said. "Well, I think that's kind of...lazy. I mean, I don't think that's very fair..."

"Well, you can't deny that there are obvious differences between men and women," she said, seeming as if she was trying not to sound offended.

"No, of course I wouldn't deny that, but that is a HUGE generalization."

"Men have testosterone, and women have estrogen."

"But that doesn't simplify the question," said Delilah. "It's a lot more complicated than that. Women have testosterone too, and men have estrogen, not to mention there are a bunch of other important hormones as well..."

"But men have _way_ more testosterone than women."

"Well, sure, but so what? Any two people of the same sex have different levels of testosterone too. In fact I bet the individual variation of testosterone levels is way higher than the average difference between sexes."

This was an impromptu and rather poorly-worded hypothesis, but it seemed she had stopped listening anyway.

Testosterone wasn't evil. She couldn't believe that this grade school battle-of-the-sexes mentality persisted, in this day and age, and in people who she thought should have been old enough to know better. Girls weren't better or smarter or nicer than boys just because they were girls. Men were not automatically inferior to women; women didn't have to "humor" them; men didn't need to be "tolerated".

Men weren't blind dumb bumbling helpless children who couldn't be held responsible for their actions because they just couldn't be expected to know any better because they didn't have the maturity and womyn-wisdom of the opposite sex. Girls were not made to take care of boys, and it actually surprised Delilah how angry it made her to realize that people actually believed that men couldn't help making bad decisions.

Oh, well, she thought as she got undressed. She had other things to think about, like her badge match tomorrow. If she won...she'd have enough badges to enter the Silver Conference.

Suddenly she burst into tears. She was so nervous and scared and she didn't feel like anybody understood or even wanted to understand. She felt alienated from other people and from herself. She didn't feel fit for this world and it wasn't a cute feeling. It just seemed like she couldn't relate to other people the way they expected her to be able to; what was _wrong_ with her?

The next morning she couldn't remember why she had been so upset, and it all just seemed incredibly stupid.

It was only April but it was very hot, since they were so far inland. Her match was at eleven o'clock, and when she got there she still had half an hour and one last slip to fill out. Gabrielle Varnham sat next to her as she filled it out and said, "Good luck today."

"Thanks," said Delilah, making the conscious effort to smile before going back to the form.

Gabrielle seemed to have expected more conversation to blossom, but she didn't object when it didn't, and they both sat there listening in on the dialogue in front of them as Delilah finished her paperwork.

"You should come," Keanna was saying to Art Christiansen.

"Of course I'm going to come!"

"Emily's going to be there."

"Ooooh, and who's Emily?" asked Tom Joyner.

"She's a friend of mine," said Keanna.

"I have been pursuing this girl for, like, months," said Art.

Delilah put the paper in front of her face and murmured to Gabrielle, "I love how he says he's been pursuing her for months, which obviously overlaps with the time you guys went out."

"I know, right? What an idiot..."

"You're going to ask her out, right?" said Keanna.

Art shrugged with a self-consciously smug smile. "Maybe I will," he said.

Gabrielle scoffed. "Are you fucking kidding me," she laughed under her breath.

Delilah couldn't tell if Gabrielle's feelings were hurt or not, but she laughed too.

As she gave her form to the receptionist, she saw that Keanna's binder had been left out. It was the kind with the clear plastic cover, in which could be slipped pictures or important papers. Hers was decorated with magazine clippings of Lance Siegfried, mostly without a shirt. Well. Hadn't Keanna said that Lance Siegfried was her "really good friend"? If he was her "really good friend", why did she have shirtless pictures of him on her binder...?

There was a local school on a fieldtrip to see the match, but truthfully Delilah wasn't sure if a pokémon match was really a good idea for a field trip. Was pokémon really that exciting, to keep a large group of children entertained for such a length of time? Delilah really thought it was quite boring, and when she watched other people battle she always ended up thinking about other things.

She couldn't tell if they were rooting for her or for Clair. Either way, they were very loud, so she assumed they were bored. At the half-point there was an intermission, and she sat on a bench on the court eating a lemon bar she quickly bought from a coffee cart. One of the fieldtrip girls in the bleachers asked her, "Do you think you're going to win?"

"That's hard to say at this point," said Delilah. "I might, I might not."

"But do you think you will?"

She shrugged. "I really don't know..."

Obviously Delilah wasn't answering the question the way she wanted her to. "But do you _think_ you will?"

"I think...I _could_..."

After the match she ended up surrounded by children in matching neon green shirts who all smelled quite bad, like candy, and sneezing. Some of them asked for her autograph, which was kind of funny.

One girl asked her, "Can I pet your vaporeon?"

"Oh, I don't think that's a good idea," said Delilah.

"I want to pet your togekiss!" said somebody else.

"Nnnoo, I don't think so," said Delilah. "I think they'd get scared, there are too many people..."

"Delilah."

Adam appeared next to her. "Oh, hi," she said. "I didn't know you were here..."

"Are you busy?"

She looked at him, and then at the group of restless kids, and then back at him, and then at the kids again. "Well," she said.

"Never mind, I'll wait," he said.

She whatevered, but the kids were pretty much done with her at that point anyway and their teachers led them out to the buses when they were done.

Adam said, "I want to talk to you."

"Okay...do you know what time it is?"

He took his BlackBerry out of his pocket. "It's 12:30 and I'm not drunk yet?" he said. "What's going on?"

"Delilah!" Tom called to her. "Nice job! Congratulations!"

"Hey there, Delilah!" said Gabrielle, smiling at her witty pop culture reference. "Great match!"

"Never heard _that_ one before!" said Delilah, and they laughed. "Thanks!"

As she and Adam crossed the street outside the gym in the subjugating heat he said, "'Hey There, Delilah'...do you get that a lot?"

"Why...yes. Yes, I do."

"How about...beautiful Delilah, bathing in the sun...audience of seventeen, and noticed not a one..."

"No, I've never had that...it's a little more awkward to work into a conversation, isn't it."

"It's a little closer to the truth," he said, and discreetly gestured behind them with his shoulder. "Those men were definitely talking about your breasts."

She wasn't really sure what to say, so she just laughed a little.

"He did a proper double-take, literally gawking," he said, playing out the scene for her. "And then he sort of said to the other, 'Do you see that?' And then they were definitely waiting, for us to walk in front of them." Then as an afterthought he added, "Not that I want to make you uncomfortable or anything."

"Nah, that's okay," she said. "I love that kind of awkward stuff. Especially when it's these Wall Street types in ties, instead of, you know, homeless crackheads, which is what it usually is."

He laughed. "Really? Homeless crackheads?"

"Of course," she said. "That's who I get the most. So these stockbroker kind of guys in suits are the funniest, because usually, you know, they're too polite."

"You know," he said, "I think most girls would be insulted."

"Well, I won't deny the whole process of objectification, but it doesn't really bother me."

"How awful it must be sometimes to be a girl," he observed philosophically.

She shrugged. Delilah was aware that she was generally attractive to men, and she understood the reasons why, but she didn't really see what they intended to accomplish by flirting with her. The logical goal, she supposed, was sexual intercourse; but why did they even bother, really, if their best attempts for her attention were as weak as "hello gorgeous"? How did they expect her to reply to that? She could not conceive of what a man could possibly hope to hear in response.

Perhaps they believed that she sought out their attention. Perhaps, if she did not want their attention, she would not be so attractive. But that wasn't really fair, was it? It wasn't something she found particularly validating. Delilah had quite large breasts and hips and a comparatively rather absurd waistline, all points conspiring to make her look somewhat cartoony. Maybe she didn't look convincingly like a real person, and so nobody felt the need to address her as one, resulting in trite and stereotypical expressions of sexual arousal.

The cafeteria in the pokémon center was sort of empty, despite the air-conditioning and the time of day.

"Well, I look like the end of a misspent life," said Adam, scrutinizing his reflection in a spoon. "Isn't it a comfort to know that even when you're out of school you'll still get spots." He had left his Mohawk hairdo uncharged. She imagined David Attenborough showing up to say that it was a communication behavior signaling that he was not posing a threat.

"What did you want to tell me?" she asked, shifting through the old magazines on the table.

"Well...about all that Team Rocket stuff," he said. "Did you...ever tell anyone about it...?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Who would I tell?"

He raised an eyebrow. It was like being whipped. "The police, maybe?"

"Oh," she said, and hoped she wasn't blushing. "Well, I don't know, I guess I just never really understood what was happening, so how could I report it, if I wasn't even sure what it was? I mean, I don't want to sound stupid..."

She thought he might make some sort of barbed comment, but he didn't. He seemed to be making an effort to get along with her. "Right, well, I talked to my dad about it..."

While leafing through a prom dress catalogue he told her that when his father pretended to break up Team Rocket, he had taken the opportunity to prune the organization of undesirable branches by having it communicated to them that the disbanding was real, this particular group of delusionists in Johto having been one of them.

"He planned the whole bloody thing," said Adam. "All that time, we were _helping_ Team Rocket."

He was clearly very angry, but she wondered if he was embarrassed. The idea made her uncomfortable, so she tried changing the subject: "I wonder, how old is Team Rocket?" she asked. "Is it as old as, like, the mafia?"

"No, it's not that old," he said. "It was his mother who started it. My grandmother."

"Oh. Is she...dead?" she asked insensitively, imagining a crime movie involving self-serving and dynamically rendered matricide as only an edgy and glamorous film noir could pull off, maybe shot with Chantilly lace over the lens to make it look mysterious and dramatic, the mother in a velvet dressing gown and a jeweled turban, her cigarette in its filigree holder still smoking in her dead hand as Giovanni Harlow put on a fedora and replaced the pearl-handled revolver in his mother's handbag (almost certainly Hermès, in a reptile's skin) on the wraparound desk.

"No, she lives in France," said Adam.

"Oh."

"We have a house on the Riviera."

That was just as good, she decided.

"Ugh, look at this," he said, showing her a page in the prom catalogue of a model in a sparkly mermaid gown. "I mean, the model is very attractive, but her body is sort of straight-up-and-down and the shape is very unflattering to her."

"Oh. Yeah, it does make her look kind of...stocky..."

"At least some of these models have got tits," he said casually, turning the page. "Not a lot of bottoms...but at least they look like girls, and not Daniel Radcliffe in a georgette bustier..."

She laughed. "Well, I can't believe _that_ dress actually exists," she said, pointing to another one. "It looks like a Barbie dress from 1994."

"It looks like an all-lesbian production of _The Great Gatsby_," he sneered, turning another page.

She burst out laughing. "You are such a catty _bitch_...!"

"It's only recently my dad's been the boss, the nineties or something. Before that he was just a gym leader." His pedigreed lip curled imperiously. "Of course, he was beaten by a thirteen-year-old kid," he said with impressive disdain.

"Well, Red was very talented," she said.

"Red was very _thirteen_," he insisted. "Your brain doesn't even stop growing until you're in your twenties."

"Some people are really smart," she said. "Red was very talented. Red was like the Mozart of pokémon. I mean, who knows? Maybe he had high-functioning autism or something. Or, maybe he was just really good at pokémon, like you are, or like I am."

He didn't say anything. She wondered if he objected to her grouping him with herself when it came to skill. He should have been flattered, she thought.

"You know how they say that only children grow up feeling comfortable around adults," she said. "I think he had some of that going on. Was that true for you? Did you have much interaction with people who were, like, twenty years older than you?"

He was smiling in a funny way. She remembered who he was.

"That's not what I meant," she said quickly. "I mean, I didn't mean to talk about that if you..."

He laughed. "I know that's not what you meant," he said, and she knew that was true, but she felt herself blushing and she was embarrassed of her embarrassment. He looked like he got a kick out of it. "I don't mind," he said. "I know I have a reputation, but it can't really bother me if it's true, can it?"

"I guess not," she agreed, wondering then if tabloid columnists even bothered making up stories about him, when there was already the truth at their disposal.

"I know what kind of a person I am," he said, looking at her severely. "I know what other people say about me. I know that any girl who goes out with me won't even tell her best friend. But there are always plenty willing, aren't there?"

He had an unsettling harshness in his voice, making her breath catch as she looked up at him and realized all of a sudden that he was probably close to a whole foot taller than she was.

"I am aware of my own reputation." His tone was sort of hard and bitter, like a jaded old movie star with gin breath lecturing a fresh-faced starlet about the state of the industry. Or something. "You all the time hear the whole thing about how monogamy is like eating one dish for every meal so you get bored of it no matter how exquisite a dish it is. But sex is not that exciting. Maybe it's different for girls, but it's really mostly the same."

"Hm," she said. "Well, I guess you could probably say that about anything. Like, the broader your horizons, the more you come to the conclusion that everything is really the same thing."

"Yeah, maybe you're right," he said. "I mean, I _like_ it, but it's quite pedestrian."

Adam had apparently slept with so many women that he had transcended the point of comparing them to each other, and simply took them for what they were.

"Have you ever thought about what your life would be like if you were a boy?"

He looked contemplative, almost somber. "Once or twice," she said. "Never very seriously." She looked at him. "Why? Do you ever think about what your life would be like if you were a girl?"

"I mean, I've heard that every man will have one relationship with an older woman. As a learning experience, I guess. But I'm a _joke_! I'm a punchline. Have you ever read about me in a magazine article? I won't say I don't deserve it, but what a reputation I've got! And they crack jokes about Team Rocket—it's shocking!"

"Well," she said. "I think that people make fun of stuff that makes them uncomfortable. Because if you, like, acknowledge that something is potentially ridiculous, it seems like not such a big deal anymore, and it's easier to deal with."

"How British," he sneered. "Anyway, she was the one who came on to me first...I just thought it might be interesting. 'Cos I like to be good at things." He looked at her like a reptile. "I like to be the best."

A chill went up her spine and she felt repelled by the intensity of his icy gaze.

"I mean, I do have that association, that I associate that generation of people with my parents. So at first I was like, all right, this is a bit weird, but...you know...people are just people," he said. "My mum got upset last night, and my father just said, 'Ivy, go and cry somewhere else.' And I think you do reach a certain age where you realise your parents are just humans."

"You're, what, three years older than I am? 1987, right?"

"That's right."

"Huh. Yeah, like, when you're seven—eight-year-olds seem impossibly mature, right? But there isn't a lot of difference between someone who's fifty-seven and someone who's fifty-eight."

"Well, it levels out," he said. "Or even look at animals. You know, rapidashes can live to be thirty, but they're full-grown by around five."

"Yeah, but I mean...I have a sister who's two years older, and a brother who's four years older. So if I had met you before, you would probably have been one of their friends instead." She paused. "Well, never mind," she said. "I forgot, you don't have siblings, so it probably doesn't mean anything to you."

She couldn't read the look on his face. "What doesn't mean anything to me?"

"I don't know." She shrugged. "Just, like, when you're in school, most of your friends are in your own grade, right? If I had a friend, if my sister was around, they would try to be more mature and cool. And naturally my sister would be a lot nicer."

He laughed, and then looked at her kind of sideways. "Do you call me your friend?"

"Not to your face."

He laughed again. "Well, I know I'm no picnic," he said, "but really I think you probably know me better than anybody. I mean..." He stopped, with a strange, unfamiliar smile. "I mean, you don't mind, do you?"

She looked at him, unsure what to think. "How could I mind?" she said.

His smile brightened, and she felt something sharp in her insides that she recognized, not without some shock, as pity.

What a strange personality Adam had! Sometimes he acted like she was his best friend, and other times he was so frosty and standoffish.

She realized suddenly that people probably thought the same thing about her. She probably seemed indifferent and superior a lot of the time.

Well, maybe she was. After all, she didn't long for friends; she rarely chose to talk to people if she could avoid it. A lot of people probably did think she was a bitch or a snob. And maybe they were right.


	9. Orgasm Addict

**09 Orgasm Addict**

Delilah never knew where she stood with Adam, but, really, she didn't even care. He would be a jerk and a villain and she would just shrug it off. But then the next time she saw him he would be so charming and disarming that she wouldn't have any reason to be mean to him. He was just a little too intense for everyday use.

"So will you be entering the Silver Conference, then?" he asked her one day, as they sat in the bleachers in a tent to see a show put on by a children's circus camp that Irwin volunteered for. Irwin had invited Delilah, who had happened to be with Adam at the time, so he had come along for lack of any other plans.

"I guess so," she said. She had received a dratini at the Blackthorn Gym, so she had six pokémon now. Which was convenient. "There's like a preparatory training retreat thing for it, on the fifth, so I guess I'll go to that."

"That sounds interesting," he said. "Maybe I'll go."

"Can you? I don't know if you can, if you're not entering the Silver Conference...I mean, you're not a citizen, right?"

"No...actually we're leaving Johto and going back home, in May."

"Oh," she said.

"Hey, you guys," said Irwin, who was walking around before the show started, selling clown noses.

"Hey," said Delilah.

"Hello," said Adam.

Irwin indicated his basket. "Clown nose?" he asked, opening the question to the bleachers in general. "They're a dollar."

"No, thanks," said Adam.

"Yeah, you'd need two of them for a nose that size, anyway, right?"

Delilah laughed, and so did the people around them, probably assuming that they were good friends. Adam gave him a look of such witheringly amiable condescension that Irwin jumped at the opportunity to turn away when a woman came up to buy a nose.

The show was cute, even though Adam complained the whole time about the sun and wasn't happy until he got a snow cone to shut him up at the intermission. After it was over Delilah wanted to hang around and wait for Irwin, and Adam deigned to wait with her. As they sat in the empty bleachers she let out her vaporeon, Farley, to walk around and play, and Adam let out his gengar.

When Irwin came out again he said, "Hey! Did you guys like the show?"

"Yeah, it was a lot of fun," said Delilah.

"Oh, I like your necklace," he said, pointing to it.

"I like the setting," said Adam, leering unapologetically into her plenteous frontage.

Irwin pursed his lips in distaste, but Delilah laughed. Farley came up to her and walked into her lap, and then Adam's gengar joined them as well.

"What's its name?" asked Irwin.

"Sheets," said Adam.

"Sheets?"

"Yeah, you know, sheets. Like a ghost."

"Knowing you," said Irwin, "that thing'll attack me at the slightest provocation."

"Well, that's a bit of a silly accusation," said Adam. "My father was a gym leader. My pokémon are trained impeccably. Speak, Sheets."

Sheets made a creepy vocalization like a giggle.

"Good. See?" said Adam. "Roll over."

Sheets lay down and rolled onto his back, going over Irwin's foot.

"Owww!" said Irwin, even though Delilah didn't think it could have hurt very much. "It crushed my foot!"

"Oh, no!" said Adam, rubbing Sheets' forequarters. "Look, Sheets! You hurt Irwin! Give him a kiss!"

Sheets jumped onto the bench next to Irwin and licked him sloppily. Irwin, who had four voltorbs, which were not historically affectionate animals, grimaced and said, "Thanks a lot! Gengar saliva is toxic!"

"Oh, go on," said Adam, letting Sheets step on his legs. "If it were that dangerous, do you think it would be permissible in pokémon matches? It'll only hurt you if it bites you. That's why biting moves are illegal for gengars in battle. Don't you think I can control my own pokémon?"

Irwin did not dignify this with a response. "Gengar saliva is like Botox," he said later as he drove Delilah to the pokémon center. "I'm lucky I can still talk. I probably can't smile properly anymore."

Delilah rolled her eyes. He was frowning pretty deep so she doubted it was that serious.

"I don't know why you even hang out with him," he said. "I mean, you can't actually _like_ him, can you?"

"Of course not," she said. "I never want to see that stupid hot jerk ever again."

"Come on, Delilah, be serious."

"What, do you think I'm an idiot?"

"Oh, no," he said. "I hope you get married and it lasts a hundred years. A good man is hard to find these days."

She laughed skeptically. "You don't have to let him bother you," she said. "I don't like him either, but I don't let it upset me..."

"If you don't like him, why do you hang out with him?"

"I don't know, I think he's funny..."

He snorted indignantly, but didn't say anything.

"So, were you guys okay, during that movie?" she asked. "How was that, it wasn't that bad, was it?"

"It was...I don't know, it was...weird," he said. "He was wearing his sunglasses the whole time, with the 3-D glasses on top, and he kept on, like, talking to this making-out couple, like, 'hey, you guys want some candy? isn't this a great movie?' and like with all these glasses on...it was weird..."

She laughed, but he didn't.

"Oh, he is such a moron," he said disapprovingly. "Why, he acts like the letter R doesn't even exist."

"Irwin," said Delilah. "He's English."

"Uhwin," he said. "The lettuh Ah. It's Adam _Hah_low, _dah_ling, _suh_tainly you've _huhd_ of me?"

She laughed. "Well, he uses R sometimes," she said. "Sometimes he calls me 'Deliler'."

"Deliler," he repeated. "Mount my stallion of desi-uh, Deliler, and ride, ride, I say, into the sunset. I'm irresistible, if you wuhn't shuh."

"Now you're starting to sound Southern," she said, laughing.

"Southuhn? Not at all! If I wuh Southuhn, I'd be able to pronounce yo' name, Deliler. Puh-haps you ought just to change it, 'cos Adam Hahlow is nevuh wrong. Too rich, you know. Chim-chim-cheree."

She was laughing so much she had to cover her mouth in case she started to drool.

"Really, Deliler, I say!" he said. "Fohsooth, and verily, gehls undress at my command, you know, so let's have a go at each ovuh, righ' heah. You might not like it the fuhst time but ahftuh sixteen mo' you'll be addicted, I swea'!"

"I'm dying!" she gasped. "Oh my God!"

"Well, see, there you ah, you're an addict now. Cahn't live wivout me, cahn ye? Doctuhs prescribe me, you know. There's a racket fuh my semen. Pow'ful stuff, pow'ful stuff. Potent. Makes MDMA look like bloody shugah pills."

"Oh, I can't breathe!"

"No need, my deah. I'll give you mouth-to-mouth, I'm generous. Why settle fuh plain old ecstasy, when you can have euphoric rapturous blissful Adam Hahlow o'gasmic rhapsody." He broke, and laughed. "Mayhaps you didn't notice, but my initials? AH." He exaggerated his face, writhing around and making a noise like a woman in the throes of passion: "Ah! Ah! _Aaaaa_aaahhhhh...!"

In this Cockney/Southern/Australian brogue, she couldn't really understand a lot of what Irwin was saying, but she laughed so hard her head hurt.

"So you see, even women who have nevuh huhd of me end up saying my name whilst they climax, pip-pip and tallyho!"

She thought she was going to die, she was laughing so much. "I'm going to pee! Oh, God!"

"Not to worry, Deliler, my fecund pleshuh blossom. That's only an o'gasm, it's a bi' of awll righ', and it's _puh_fectly _now_mal. Aftuh all, you _ah_ sitting next to me, it's only natural."

Maybe it was Delilah's problem, not Irwin's. There was nothing _wrong_ with Irwin. In fact, wasn't he what most girls wanted in a boyfriend? Irwin was nice, and attentive, and cute. Why didn't that appeal to Delilah? Why didn't she have any desire to interact with Irwin beyond the scope of friendship? He was reasonably attractive, so why wasn't she reasonably attracted to him?

Maybe Delilah was missing something, some big thing that everybody else had that allowed them to feel natural emotions; why didn't she have one? Why couldn't she have normal relationships with other people? But maybe Irwin _didn't_ like her in some special way. Maybe there _wasn't_ something there that she didn't understand. Maybe the idea of "_like_-liking" somebody was utter invention.

It wasn't that Delilah didn't believe in love—she loved her pokémon, and she probably loved her family or something—but she was a bit leery of the validity of romance. On the one hand, most songs were love songs, so apparently _somebody_ believed it—if not the artists, then the listeners. But on the other hand, arguably the most powerful thing in the world was money, and money was just green paper—the only reason it was of any value was because people wanted to believe that it was. Was it the same thing, a mirage on a pedestal?

Delilah just didn't understand what people actually _did_ when they liked each other or when they were in love. If she became Irwin's girlfriend, or if they started dating, how would that change their relationship? They would have sex. They would kiss each other and hold hands. But people didn't have to be in love to do those things; lots of people had sex or sexual relationships with their friends. What was the difference? And why did it matter? What was the _point_?

Adam did end up going to the prep retreat; when Falkner and Eusine came to pick her up, he was sitting in the backseat with a bag of trail mix that Falkner had brought.

"Hey, guys, can you hand me an Oreo?" asked Falkner, holding out his hand without taking his eyes off the road.

"No, sorry," said Adam.

Falkner laughed. "What? I don't think you are sorry."

"I'll be eating all of these Oreos," said Adam, putting his arm out to stop Delilah from handing Falkner one of the mini Oreos from the trail mix. "This is my private magazine of trail mix."

"What—dude, just give me one," said Falkner, looking back and trying to get one himself.

"Falkner, you need to drive," said Adam. "Leave me to build four chins, in a graceful cascade down to my navel. I'll eat until my shirt looks like a bra."

Eusine laughed, which encouraged Adam to continue.

"I'm abusing the ground I'm walking on. My bingo wings go down to my thighs," he said. "My thighs go down to HELL..."

Delilah covered her face as she convulsed in laughter.

"I'm playing pat-a-cake with my breasts," said Adam, opening another Oreo and scraping the icing off with his teeth as Delilah wiped tears from her eyes.

Falkner held his hand out between the two front seats and said, "Seriously, guys, can I have an Oreo?"

Adam caught Delilah's eye. He unwrapped some gum he had apparently been chewing and stuck it between the sides of the Oreo.

"Thanks," said Falkner.

Eusine turned up the radio. "Aretha is my life," he said.

"Augh! Adam! Fucking asshole!" Falkner laughed, rolling down the window to spit his chocolaty cud into the wind.

Everyone who would be entering the Silver Conference was given a sort of questionnaire, asking questions she didn't know like why she was entering and what made her want to be a pokémon trainer, and they all began to get on the buses.

She was sitting by herself and struggling with these difficult questions when Adam strolled up and asked, "Would you mind if I sat here?"

"No, go ahead," she said.

"What are you doing?"

"I have to fill out a form," she said.

"Well, if there's a thing you can do right," said Adam as he took out a book, "it's fill out your form."

The organizer started to pass by them as he walked up the aisle from the back, and then he tripped. He looked at the backpack on the floor and gave Adam a dirty look.

"Could you _not_ keep your stuff in the aisles?" he said with a glare before walking on.

"Whatever," Adam muttered, and went back to reading.

This lack of concern for others did not really shock Delilah, but it did surprise her that he wouldn't do something when directly asked.

When he got to the front of the bus the organizer made sure everybody had gotten forms who needed them and said a few words about how proud he was, and then the buses began to move.

Delilah had finished half her survey and was mindlessly pushing back her cuticles with her fingernails when a man started walking up the aisle; he tripped, as had happened to the organizer, who hurried down the aisle and asked, "What happened?"

"I tripped over this goddamn backpack in the aisle!" said the guy, standing up and nursing his elbow.

The organizer let him pass and then bore down on Adam. "Look, kid," he said, pointing at the backpack. "That man could have been hurt thanks to that backpack."

Adam looked unconcerned. "Oh, dear. It would suit him to be more careful in future," he remarked politely.

"Now, listen, punk," he said, getting angrier. "If that thing's not out of the aisle when I count to three, I'm going to throw it out the window!"

"You had better not," Adam snorted. "It would only be trouble for you."

"Oh, yeah? I organized this whole thing and what I say goes! If that backpack doesn't disappear, it's gone!" He stuck out his index finger. "One!"

Adam looked at him blankly.

He put up another finger. "Two!"

Adam still didn't move.

The last finger went up. "Three! Okay, then, if that's how you want to play!"

He picked up the backpack, leaned over Adam and Delilah to push the window down all the way, and dropped the backpack through it. Delilah turned to watch it whiz away before falling to the ground and rolling sadly out of sight.

"That'll teach you a lesson," he said firmly.

"It certainly did," Adam agreed. "I'll always keep my things out of the aisle."

The organizer looked sort of awkward and guilty. "Hey, you're a good sport, buddy," he said. "I'm sorry I took such extreme measures."

"That's all right; I really learned something," said Adam. "Anyway, it wasn't mine."

Adam talked to people like they were dirt under his feet, shrugging off friendliness with an aloof arrogance, such that it was difficult for people, she supposed, to feel anything but affronted or resentful.

That wasn't quite how Delilah felt, however. She certainly didn't feel compassion for Adam, but she was really just sort of amused by him. Delilah never invested very much in people, and so she mostly felt a great deal of detachment from her relationship with Adam, meaning that she just had never cared enough to be insulted.

When they got off the bus Adam went looking for a vending machine, saying he had a headache because he was reading on the bus. She stood there watching the other people around her when a man walking by whistled at her.

"Hey, gorgeous!" he said. "Need any help?"

"Help with what?" she asked, unsure if she should be insulted by the implications of this confusing line.

"Anything you want, sweetheart!" he said, and gestured to the guy behind him. "My friend'll get lost if I tell him to."

"Maybe so, but will mine?" she asked as Adam came strutting back over like a waltzing cockerel.

The guy squawked an apology and hurried away with his friend.

Adam watched them go, twisting open a water bottle.

"What was that about?" he asked, as if oblivious to his frightening appearance.

"He thought you were my boyfriend," she said.

"Was he trying to chat you up?"

"I guess."

"Don't worry, Delilah," he said, but it came out sort of wrong around the cigarette in his mouth. "I'll be your guardian angel."

"Well, I hate to bring it up, but that leer on your face is barely angelic," she said.

"Delilah, there are two things that I do better than _anybody_," he said. "Scaring away undesirable parties"—he blew smoke directly into her face so she squinted—"is the other one."

She felt like her skin was inside-out, like her underwear had melted right down her legs. "You know...you're not really supposed to smoke within twenty feet of a public building," she said, ignoring her sympathetic nervous system kicking in.

"You know, it's also quite bad for you?" he said.

Adam knew how other people were affected by him. He fully understood the repercussions of his actions; he just didn't care. And while in a way she found this dubiously admirable, he was still a thoroughly unpleasant person. He and Delilah had fallen into a swing of putting each other down, but neither of them took it seriously enough to be hurt.

Besides, he was very good-looking and emotionally unavailable with money and a swoony accent; just because she acknowledged his unsavoriness didn't mean she was immune to his questionable charms.

Inside they listened to people talk for a very long, boring time; finally they were given a number of sheets of paper and told to find partners to answer the questions.

Delilah was about to turn to Adam next to her to ask if he wanted to be her partner when a girl came up and tilted her head at a certain angle and smiled and said, "Hi! Do you want to be partners?"

"No," said Adam.

She blinked. "Oh," she said. "Well, okay."

Adam did not even have the courtesy to wait until she was out of earshot before he turned to Delilah and asked, "Do you want to be my partner?"

She did want to be his partner, but she felt tacky accepting the invitation when the girl could hear, so instead she said, "That was shitty..."

"It was true," he said, glancing at the back of the poor girl, retreating to her group of friends. "You're the trainer I've had the most trouble battling. Why wouldn't I want to be your partner, then?"

"I'm just saying. Do you know how much courage it takes to approach you?"

"She could at least be honest about her intentions, as well. We can still have sex, but there's no reason why we should be partners, too."

She briefly made a face that artfully blended amusement, disbelief, and scorn. Then she stood up and looked at the first question. "What do you think is the best hold?" she asked, looking for the first time at the way she held a poké ball. How much difference did it really make? Was she doing something wrong, that made her look like she didn't know what she was doing?

"This one," said Adam, sliding his hand around her hip.

She froze up for a second, not sure what to do. "Well, I'm glad you like my form," she joked with desperate corniness, "but you're supposed to be helping me, not helping yourself."

"I'm going to go find the toilet," said Adam. "I have a headache."

"I think that's my line," said Delilah.

He went off to find the bathroom and she sat down with her dratini, whom she had named Dovima. Eventually Whitney came over to her and asked, "Don't you have a partner?"

"He went to the bathroom."

"Oh, okay. Anyway, sorry I couldn't drive you this morning, I know you had to go with Falkner and Eusine, hopefully that wasn't too horrifying..."

She laughed. "Nah, it was fun," she said. "They're funny."

"God, Eusine is so fricking annoying," said Whitney. "I mean, he's funny, but he's so whiny and annoying...I'm really kind of starting to hate him..."

"Yeah? What does he do?"

"Well, just...he and Morty are just, like, so stupid, I can't even get over it. I mean, Morty has, like, _hit_ Eusine. Like, he's beaten him up."

"Really?"

"I know, right? Like, you totally wouldn't expect that, but it's because they're drunk! I mean, all of their problems are just because they drink! A few months back, I set up a tent in the backyard, for sleepovers, and Morty, Eusine, and Falkner were all over, and I was already in bed, actually, I don't know what they all were doing. According to Eusine, he fell asleep in the tent, not knowing that Morty was waiting for him for like two hours, so Morty came in like, 'why did you do that' and just started beating the crap out of him in the tent."

"In a tent...?"

"I know, right! In a tent! Like, what a lame fight, but I could hear it all because it was right outside my window, and oh my God I was so scared...but so then I hear Falkner go out there, and I thought he was going to break it up, but no, he just sat there, and watched. And I'm like...Falkner...what are you doing. I don't know, maybe he was drunk too. So they both left and Eusine's all crying, like, 'I don't want to be with him, when he's like this,' and I'm just like...if you guys would just _stop drinking_, this would not be a problem! I don't know, it's so fucking stupid."

"Does that happen a lot?"

"No, not really the fighting stuff, but they have all kinds of weird, dumb, gay drama, like they're always breaking up supposedly. But then they just have sex and are like, 'oh, we're in love, we're totally fine and we don't drink anymore,' and of course that lasts like two weeks before they drink again. It's so stupid..."

Adam came back in then. Adam's walk usually said quite clearly, "Stand aside, dull peasants! Sadly you will never know what it is like to enter a room bigger, hotter, and fiercer than anyone who might try to tell you to shut up."

At that moment his face was very red. She thought maybe he had gotten a terrific sunburn, but then he turned green, and then a chalky white. Clearly it was Cinco de Mayo. Then he fell down.

Falkner hurried over to him and said his name a few times.

Adam frowned, his eyes still closed. "Is my nose bleeding?" he mumbled, touching his face.

"No, are you okay?"

"I'm going to be sick," he said. "I'm going to be sick..."

He didn't throw up, even though he kept saying he was going to; eventually somebody called an ambulance, and he was carried away like Cleopatra in a sedan chair.

Morty went in the ambulance with him and Eusine said, "Somebody should call his parents."

Delilah was unfortunately the closest to Adam's backpack, so this responsibility apparently rested with her. She dug past his passport, poké balls, cigarettes, and a few hundred dollars before finding his BlackBerry; however, there were five different numbers labeled "Daddy": there was "Daddy", "Daddy 2", "Daddy 3", "Daddy HO", and "Daddy SC", right above "Delilah Peerenboom" and somebody named "dumb bitch".

She threw up her hands exasperatedly, and Whitney took the phone from her and picked one of them.

"Hi, Mr Harlow?" she said in a businesslike tone that Delilah had never heard her use. "This is Whitney Delwyn of the Goldenrod Gym, I'm at the Silver Conference Prep Retreat where Adam just fainted. He's fine, but we thought we should let you know that he felt sick and he passed out, but he's being taken to the hospital right now so don't worry."

There was a pause as she listened to Adam's father speak for a moment.

"Well, he's in the ambulance," she explained. "They're taking him to the hospital."

Adam's father spoke again, his voice rising enough that Delilah could hear it, but not enough that she could understand it.

Unfortunately nobody knew what hospital Adam was being taken to. This caused Whitney great suffering until tears were rolling down her cheeks and Mr Harlow was screaming, "WHERE IS MY SON?"

This went on for a crucifying length of time before Eusine had the sense to call Morty and ask him, and Whitney lamented Eusine's being the most intelligent person in the room.


	10. I HatePeople

**10 I Hate...People**

Delilah examined it as if it were an extraterrestrial on an operation table. There were strange parts and odd mechanical functions; the sack dangled stupidly from the pipe, and overall she found it unwieldy and ridiculous-looking.

"How do you do it?" she asked, eyeing it curiously.

"You've never done it before?"

"No."

Irwin looked at her skeptically. "Well, haven't you ever vacuumed?"

"Ummm...no?"

"Jesus Christ, Delilah," he said, picking up the dusty leaf blower they had found in the closet. "It's not that hard."

"Well, excuse me for not being a domestic goddess like you," she said as he switched it to the vacuum setting.

It was a balmy day, a break from the usual cloudy spring skies that brought Johto into its hot, dry summers, and Delilah was celebrating the nice weather by spilling ultra premium active diet cat food all over her room in the Goldenrod pokémon center.

Irwin pulled the starter cord; nothing happened.

He pulled it again; the results were similar.

"What's wrong with it?" asked Delilah as her Pokégear rang.

"It's fine," said Irwin. "It just needs one big jerk."

She looked at her Pokégear. "Oh, it's Adam," she said, surprised.

"Speak of the devil and he doth appear," said Irwin, unenthused.

She laughed. "Hey, man, what's up?"

"Hi, Delilah," said Adam. "What are you doing today?"

"Uhh...well, not a lot, why? Is something wrong?"

"No," he said, seeming surprised. "I just thought I'd see if you wanted to hang out or something."

Hang out?

With Adam?

Just for the sake of hanging out?

She was immediately suspicious; they had hung out before, but always as sort of an afterthought to some kind of messed up adventure. They had never gone out of their way just to "hang out". Why would he want to hang out with her?

She hesitated. "Umm," she said. "Well, like...what do you mean?"

"What? I don't know," he said. "I mean, if you wanted to see a movie, or hang around here at the hotel, we could go swimming or something, I don't know. I mean, if you don't _want_ to, whatever; I just thought I'd ask..."

"Well, no, that's fine," she said quickly. "It's just, I'm with Irwin right now, we were going to hang out today..."

"Oh."

"So, maybe another..."

"I guess he could come too." He sounded less than excited.

"...Okay, well, I'll ask him." She turned to Irwin. "Adam wants to know if we want to hang out with him."

Irwin made a weird face. "Really?"

"Sure, do you want to?"

"Well..." She was pretty sure that he didn't want to, but she awaited his answer all the same. "Well, like, and do what?" he asked.

"Well, he said we could hang out at his hotel, the Piedra Blanca in Olivine, I'm sure it's nice," she said, deciding not to mention the idea of going to another movie, even though it sounded pretty good to sit in an air-conditioned cinema for a couple of hours.

"Okay...I guess," he said, clearly against his better judgment.

Adam said he would "have a car sent round" for them, and while Irwin went home to put on a bathing suit Delilah let her pokémon eat the cat food off the floor, and put on a skirt over a bathing suit.

In the car Irwin said, "That Adam thinks he's the center of the universe."

"Well, girls certainly gravitate to him," said Delilah.

"One of these days," vowed Irwin, shaking his fist. "One of these days, I'm really going to do it. Bam! Pow!"

She laughed skeptically at him. "Oh, really? Straight to the moon?"

"Sure. I'm not a 97-pound weakling. I've got what it takes."

"Yeah: a complete lack of common sense. Don't be dumb, Irwin. You can be a 500-pound weakling for all I care, but Adam doesn't need to be provoked."

"There's nothing to fear but fear itself," professed Irwin. "That's what President Franklin Delano Roosevelt said."

"Cool guy, but FDR never met Adam, did he?"

"I really don't get it," said Irwin. "I mean, no offense, but how can one guy be so mean and so nasty? And how can one guy still have every girl think he's the sexiest thing to ever walk the earth?"

"Practice...?"

"I just don't get it," he said again. "I mean, he is everything girls claim they _don't_ want, but they can't get _enough_ of him!"

"Well, is that his fault?" Irwin didn't answer, so she kept going. "He may not be subtle, and he may not be smart, but he's effective and you can't argue results..."

Indeed, Delilah's first thought when he called her was that he meant to consummate their relationship; he had gotten sort of handsy on the retreat, but if his intention was to make a sexual overture, why would he let Irwin come? Adam didn't consider her his friend, did he?

Adam was waiting for them by the fountain in bright swim trunks that clashed interestingly with preppy Madras plaid flip-flops, dipping a Popsicle in a glass of Green Chartreuse. Irwin immediately looked like he regretted coming.

Adam said, "Hi."

Delilah said, "Hi."

Irwin didn't say anything.

"So what do you want to do?" asked Adam, licking a Popsicle drip off of the Jolly Roger tattooed by the chatot inside his arm. "We could swim, or play tennis, or we could go down the beach. It's not really close by, but there's a shuttle..."

"Why do you need us?" asked Irwin abruptly.

Adam fellated his Popsicle in confusion, and made an educated guess: "For company?"

"You don't need company," scoffed Irwin. "You enjoy yourself too much."

She expected Adam to get mad, but instead he just shrugged, sweeping hair away from his face. "How about tennis, then?" he said. "Do you like tennis? Or badminton?"

"I like them," said Delilah, "but for me it's more like 'awfulminton'. I am not good at sports at all. But I guess if you guys want to..."

Irwin laughed for some reason. "Well, your heart's in the right place," he said, as if this were such a nice thing for her to have said.

"So is everything else," said Adam, touching the back of her leg. It tickled and she squeaked spastically and jumped away, brushing his hand off, and he laughed.

"Oh, give me a break," Irwin muttered.

"Is that a frown?" asked Adam. "Is that a _frown_, marring the fine features of that ugly face?"

"You're a fine one to talk about ugly," said Irwin, his forehead creasing in disapproval.

Adam's jaw set arrogantly. "Bite your tongue, vaginismus. I don't _do_ ugly," he said, flicking hair out of his eyes. "Not on the outside, anyway, where it matters."

Delilah was actually surprised that it had taken this long for Adam to call him an obscure name, for he always seemed to have some casually gladiatorial remark on the tip of his sharp pierced tongue.

The Piedra Blanca was a country club kind of hotel, with swimming pools and tennis courts and a gym and a spa and restaurants with dress codes. On the way to the beach Irwin asked Adam how much everything cost, and he said he paid eighteen dollars for a hamburger by the pool. "Is that a lot?" he asked.

"Yes," said Irwin. "Yes, that is a lot."

"Quite a good hamburger," said Adam.

"It better have been. I don't think I can afford to breathe the air here—jeez!" He glanced around. "This hotel is _really_ exclusive, isn't it?"

"It was," said Delilah. "But then I was invited in."

"I mean, jeez, are you sure we don't need, like, tickets, or something?"

"Of course not," said Adam, flinging his arm outward. "There are men with syringes at the doors," he said, pantomiming drawing blood from the inside of his elbow. "They stick a needle in you. If it comes up blue, you're in. A crisp, frosty blue, like ice water. If it's red, they throw you out the back door. If it's a sort of a purply red, they'll let you be thrown out the front door."

Delilah laughed, but Irwin didn't seem sure that he was joking.

On the beach Adam tugged on her skirt and said, "You should take this off."

She was sort of surprised at this open sleaziness, although she knew she probably shouldn't have been. "Okay," she said, pulling it over her head because the smocked waist didn't fit past her hips. "But it would really be fairer if you took off your shirt."

He did, and then blatantly looked her up and down.

"Why, Adam!" she pouted as she sat down. "Sometimes I think you only like me for my body!"

"Why, Delilah!" he gasped. "Actually that's not true at all!"

"Why, Adam! Are you saying there's something wrong with my body?"

"Why, Delilah! I like your cheerful compassion and your common sense."

She laughed. "I think you confuse me with somebody else."

"Well, then you had better settle for me liking your body," he said. "Of course, a comely houri such as yourself—"

Irwin looked harassed. "Don't insult Delilah," he said.

Adam looked at him weirdly, and then ignored him.

"Do I have a tan line?" asked Delilah, noticing the gradation on her chest like the stomach of a sharpedo.

"A little bit," said Irwin.

"Count yourself lucky," said Adam. "My whole body is one big tan line. What a pity, to have red hair," he sighed. "I've never got a tan in my life. Fat lot of good that quarter of Italian did me. The sun only treats me like a bloody sambuca..." He lifted his arm to shade his eyes for a moment as he looked at the ocean.

"Mmm, that's nice," said Irwin, deadpan, of the dark axillary hair in his face.

"Hungry?" asked Adam, leaning closer and scratching his armpit. "One lump or two?"

Irwin ignored him.

"I shave them sometimes," Adam said informatively, petting his armpit.

"Wonderful," said Irwin.

"It's refreshing, you ought to try it once at least."

"No thanks."

"I did it a few times for shoots," Adam continued mercilessly. "Now I just do it now and then, because it feels really clean. If you've got sweaty and dirty, after you clean up you should try shaving them, it just feels very fresh."

Irwin said, "I am so glad you're sharing this with me."

Adam didn't respond, and stood up. "I'm going to see if we can get some ice cream," he said. "Do you want any?"

"I'll have some," said Delilah.

"Irwin?"

Irwin shook his head silently, and it was a struggle not to roll her eyes. Adam walked off with a shrug and Irwin looked after him, moping.

"Tskugh! Isn't that disgusting!" he said, watching Adam turn heads as he swaggered away. "Look at the way they positively drool over him! Why, he has to beat them off with a stick! Or, he _would_, if he _ever turned anybody down_!"

She sighed, trying not to sound exasperated.

"I mean, jeez!" said Irwin, leaning his face in his hand. "Does he have to go around everywhere showing off his perfect face and his perfect body...?"

She laughed scathingly. "Dude, what do you expect Adam to show off? His perfect _mind_?"

Irwin didn't laugh or say anything for a few minutes, and continued to watch Adam with rapt, envious fascination; then he said, "Well, you have to admit, Delilah, he is pretty good-looking."

Delilah was too surprised to answer, and thought that Irwin would probably fly into a jealous conniption if she did actually admit that Adam was pretty good-looking.

"And, you know, he says some kind of funny things sometimes," he continued. "And he really is good at pokémon. And, of course, he's got more money than the United States Mint."

"Gosh," said Delilah. "Maybe one day I'll like him as much as you do."

"_Like_ him? I HATE him!"

"That's what I thought," she sighed disappointedly, more because he missed her sarcasm than because he didn't like Adam.

"You know what's the trouble with him," said Irwin, as if all of Adam's numerous and sundry flaws could be summed up into one trouble. "The trouble with him is that just because he's rich and tall and good-looking and has twelve cars and a yacht and six houses he thinks he can get whatever he wants!"

"And the horrible truth," said Delilah, "is that he can."

"Yeah? Well, I feel sorry for him," Irwin claimed with resolute righteousness. "He's just a nasty rich person. Because...because, if it weren't for his money, and influence, and his being so advantaged, do you know what he'd be?"

"Somebody other than Adam Harlow?"

"That would be a step in the right—"

Irwin cut off abruptly, clamming up again as Adam returned with two ice cream cones.

"I got different kinds," he said, offering them to her as he sat down. "I wasn't sure what you would like..."

"What are they?" she asked, taking one of them.

"That one has vanilla, lemon, and strawberry, and this one's chocolate, butterscotch, and dulce de leche. You can try some of this one, too, though, if you like."

"Okay. Do you want to try some of this one?" she asked, holding it out to him. Instead of taking it from her, his reptilian eyes flicked over to Irwin and he leaned over and ate it out of her hand in an aggressively sexual way.

Irwin looked away pointedly, and Delilah laughed to try to defuse the horrible awkwardness.

"Do you want some, Irwin?" she asked.

"No, thanks," he said primly.

"You're right, it's _crawling_ with all kinds of exotic VD now," she said sarcastically, rolling her eyes and licking a pink drip off of the side of the cone.

Adam laughed. "Which of us was that meant to offend?" he asked.

"Both, if I executed it right," she said, and watched him scoop ice cream onto his finger and lick it off. She laughed and said, "Do you want a spoon, Adam?"

"Sure," he said immediately, coiling his free arm around her waist. "I admit I'm surprised at the suggestion."

"Oh, shut up," she laughed, and pushed him off.

"Don't be mean to him, Delilah!" Irwin chided her. "It's Be Kind to Animals Week!"

"Shut the fuck up, Irwin," Adam growled warningly.

"I'm sick of being second-fiddle Mr Nice Guy," said Irwin suddenly, standing up. "From now, I'm going to take what I want. I'm going to be cold-blooded and underhanded. Nice guys finish last, and the aggressive people get what they want."

He kicked up some sand.

"Hey!" said Adam, sitting up and rubbing his eyes. "That was right in my face, borborygmus!"

"Right!" Irwin agreed. "Now, _I'm_ going to be the bully! I kicked sand in your face, so you go home now and call Charles Atlas so you won't be a wimp anymore."

Adam scowled. "There's a flaw in your logic, matey," he said, and kicked him, knocking his feet out from under him and making Delilah jump. "I was never a 97-pound weakling to begin with."

"That doesn't bother me," Irwin insisted, standing up and rubbing his hip. "I'm underhanded now, and cold-blooded, so I'll bounce back with an evil scheme." He started walking away, then turned and called, "I'll cheat, and lie, and do bad things, until I get what I want!"

"What is _wrong_ with him," Adam mumbled.

"He's trying to impress me," said Delilah.

"By acting like a douchebag?"

"By acting like you."

Adam didn't respond.

Delilah was still puzzling over the fact that Irwin had referred to himself as "second-fiddle", presumably to Adam. She thought it was a little conceited of him, considering he wasn't even in the orchestra. And it wasn't like he was even that nice of a guy; maybe compared to Adam he was Mother Teresa, but she didn't think it would ever occur to her to refer to him as "Mr Nice Guy".

She was surprised that he would leave her alone and exposed to all the sinister perfection of a raffish, fleering, genetically superior miscreant like Adam who could probably remove a bra with his aristocratic nostrils.

"So why did you want to hang out?" she asked, figuring he must have had some motive.

"My dad's not working today," he said. "I don't want him to try to spend time with me."

"Is he really that bad?"

"I can't stand him. At least now if he tries anything you and Irwin will be there, so he can't get too weird."

"I was wondering why you would let Irwin come."

"He's so annoying," said Adam. "I can't imagine what it must be like for you."

"Oh, he's not that bad," she said.

"He's a juggler. He gets _paid_ to be annoying. He fancies you rotten, it must be awful."

"Well...I guess that's just the price of being the target of his affections..."

"Targets, now?" he said. "How amateur. Even if by some miracle that kernicterus managed a bull's eye, one doesn't bag any game shooting at targets. We can only hope that right now he's learning to hunt...learning to set an attractive trap, to bait his line with a lure. Humans don't have estrus so girls are always in season, after all."

"Gosh! As a 24-karat Don Juan, maybe you should be his coach."

Adam scoffed. "Not even if I were sober," he said.

"It sounds like a bad movie," she said. "There could be Shakespearean love mix-ups, and election bets or something..."

"Hey, look, a dollar," said Adam, finding a bill under his chair.

"You must be specially attuned to the smell of money."

"Maybe I should leave it," he pondered, looking at George Washington's face. "Sometimes my mum leaves money under dressers and things, so Marie won't lose interest in cleaning."

Delilah's first instinct was to laugh in shock; the fact that he wasn't joking was sort of frightening. "You are such a...!"

His mouth twisted around into half of a smile that was a little bit pert. "A what?"

She searched her vocabulary for an answer. "You are such a WASP," she said.

He laughed, a short, seductive eruption of sound. "Nobody's a WASP in Britain," he said. "It's not a minority there."

A hotel employee approached them and said, "Excuse me, Adam, there's a message for you in the club house from your father."

Adam raised an eyebrow at Delilah and stood up. "I'll be right back," he said.

No sooner had he left than Irwin showed up again. "What got into you?" she asked him.

"That's part of my new, hateful personality: I bribed that man to get him away from you."

"Oh, really..."

"Twenty bucks. Now I'll take what I want and go," he said, grabbing her arm.

"Hey!" she protested, laughing nervously. He pulled her to her feet and dragged her away. "Irwin! What do you think you're doing?"

"I'm being a different person now," he said, holding her by the wrists. "From now on, I'm just going to take what I want."

"Okayyy..."

"There are two kinds of people, Delilah," he said, sounding more depraved and insane by the minute. "There are takers, and there are those who get taken. You know what I am?"

"Um...a taker?" she guessed uncomfortably.

His posture sagged. "No." He let go of her pathetically. "I'm ashamed, that's what I am. I can't be like this!"

"Hey, you two—" Adam began, showing up out of nowhere.

"Here, Adam," surrendered Irwin, pushing Delilah toward him. "I don't know what I was thinking. That's just not how I am."

"Um...okay," agreed Adam. "Anyway, my father's on the yacht, and he's invited us aboard. He's sent the outboard for us, so we should go meet it..."

Irwin looked dumbfounded. "What!"

"What?" asked Adam. "That was a message I got at the club house."

"But you didn't get a message!" Irwin sputtered. "That dirty swindler! I gave that guy a twenty to get rid of you!"

"Oh, you did, did you?" Adam scowled. "You know what, Irwin? I'll bet you a dollar I could give you a black eye without touching you."

"All right," said Irwin, drawing himself up confidently. "It's a bet!"

Adam smiled radiantly, drew back, and performed an exquisite pivot jab, connecting uninterrupted with Irwin's face.

"Oh my God!" cried Delilah as Irwin lost his footing in the sand. "Are you okay, Irwin! That's definitely a black eye...!"

Irwin shook his head and stood up slowly. "But Adam touched me," he said.

"So I did," said Adam casually, handing him the dollar bill. "Here's your dollar."

"Ugh!" said Irwin. "What the fuck, Adam? What the fuck?"

"You guys—chill out," said Delilah pointlessly.

"I'm just going to say it: I don't know why girls are so attracted to you, Adam!" said Irwin, gesticulating randomly. "You do it all wrong!"

"Ex_cuse_ me?" asked Adam, taken aback.

"It doesn't make sense for girls to be attracted to you."

Adam looked shocked and puzzled. "_So_?" he asked. "Is it that _important_ to you? What do you think attracts girls, if you've had such wild success?"

"Girls want to be needed," said Irwin. "Appealing to the mother instinct. They like to have something to take care of!"

Adam looked threatening. "I'll turn you into an object of sympathy if that's what you really want!" he offered.

"Oh, come on," said Delilah. "Calm down, okay? It's not a big deal."

"Delilah, you're a girl," Irwin enlightened her. "Tell him."

"Whoooaaa! Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. _Whoa_. No way," said Delilah, putting up her hands. "I am not going to get involved in this stupid ego clash. I can't afford to lose any of my IQ points."

"Well, you're right," Irwin decided, standing up straight. "I'm too smart for this kind of behavior."

Adam raised a doubting eyebrow. "Oh, really?"

"Yeah, really! I've got more brains in my whole head than you've got in one finger!"

Adam laughed. "Hah! Sure you have," he said, patting him encouragingly on the shoulder and walking past him.

They followed. Irwin suddenly stopped and looked at Delilah with worried resignation. "That came out wrong, didn't it?" he asked.

"I'm not so sure," she sighed.

Adam's father was distinguished and brutally handsome, with sharp eyes, sharper tailoring, and dark hair that was graying up either side of his head in dramatic fashion.

"You can call me Giovanni," he said. "Adam, it would be polite to introduce me, sweetheart."

"All right," Adam sighed. "This is a friend of mine called Delilah, and this is a complete tosser I know called Irwin."

"Adam! Don't talk about your friends that way..."

"He's not my friend," said Adam uninterestedly.

"What a nasty mouth you have on you! I shouldn't wonder he's not your friend!"

"So what," sneered Adam, suddenly in a very bad mood. "Who needs friends anyway."

"I disagree, Adam," Irwin interjected jauntily. "You know they say no man is an island, or even a peninsula."

"Adam Island," Adam snarled, looking like a persian ready to attack. "And the beaches are mined, so _piss off_."

"Tchah! Adam!" Giovanni clucked. "Crudele! Lasciamo che sia, okay? Not terribly grown-up right now, are we?"

Adam crossed his arms huffily. "Mi dispiace," he said caustically. Whatever it was, it sounded like something horribly mean.

"Don't be so unsociable," said Giovanni warningly. "Honestly, a conversation with you is about as safe as Russian roulette."

"That's unfair, Mr Harlow," Irwin objected. "In Russian roulette, you at least have a chance."

"Shut the hell _up_, Irwin!" Adam shouted with magnificent ignorance of the fact that he was proving their point.

"Adam!" Giovanni gasped even though he apparently was used to it.

"What's the matter, Adam?" asked Irwin. "Don't you have a sense of humor?"

"What's the matter, Irwin?" asked Adam. "Don't you have a hospital plan?"

"Stop it, Adam!" Giovanni snapped. "Express your feelings in a less destructive way. Violence is the last resort of an exhausted mind. Think! Just _tell_ Irwin, what are you thinking?"

"I'm just thinking about how exhausted my mind is getting of this disgusting abscission!"

With flagrant disregard for his personal comfort and safety, Irwin punched Adam, who slugged him back. Giovanni stood back to watch indifferently, and Delilah in the hubbub was knocked over the side of the boat.

She floundered in the water for a few moments before Giovanni helped her onto the stairs leading up the side of the yacht.

"Are you all right, dear?" he asked.

"Yes, I think so," she laughed, pushing wet hair away from her face and coughing as he led her back up to the deck, where Adam and Irwin had for the moment stopped fighting.

"Oh, God, I'm sorry!" said Irwin in horror. "I can't believe I was so clumsy! I'm so sorry! I'm so stupid...!"

Adam looked at him. "Huh," he said. "What more can I say?"

"There's a room you can change in," said Giovanni. "Why don't you lads wait in the game room while Delilah changes?"

"Do you need mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, Delilah?" asked Adam with concerned interest.

"What are you talking about?" asked Irwin. "She's totally conscious."

"Technicality," said Adam, watching her shiver and rub her arms. "How about a warm embrace?"

"Irwin, I am so very sorry," said Giovanni, ignoring Adam completely. "I understand totally if you choose to take legal action. I'd even provide you with a lawyer."

Irwin, embarrassed, shrugged it off with some noncommittal mumbling, and Giovanni ushered him and Adam into the game room before directing Delilah to a room with a computer because she abused her pokémon trainer's rights to the Item Storage System by keeping her clothes on it.

After she had changed her clothes and come out, Giovanni put his finger to his lips and led her silently down the stairs and back into the outboard with the whole crew.

"No sense hanging about," he said pleasantly as one of the sailors zipped them back to shore.

"That boat must have cost a fortune," said Delilah, glancing back at it.

"I'll make another," he shrugged.

"I wonder if they'll get lost or something," she said.

"If that's not worth a fortune, I don't know what is. Why don't you join Adam's mother and me at the hotel for lunch?"

She smiled. "I'd love to," she said.


	11. One Track Mind

**11 One Track Mind**

Adam's mother was, predictably, an extraordinarily beautiful woman, genetically justifying Adam's devastating handsomeness. As First Lady of Team Rocket, she was cool, elegant, and breathtakingly well-bred. She introduced herself as Ivy and smiled brilliantly, the same dazzling smile with whose presence Adam would occasionally grace those lucky few he deemed worthy.

After lamenting Adam's behavior that day Giovanni sighed and said, "If it weren't for his face..."

Delilah couldn't figure out what he meant. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"It's the only thing he's got!" he said. "He'd be utterly lost without his face."

"Well, anybody would get lost, if they didn't have eyes," she said.

He threw his head back and laughed, even though it wasn't that great of a joke.

It was true that Adam probably didn't have an awful lot going for him apart from the way he looked. How aware he was of this, she couldn't be sure.

"I don't know what to do with him," said Giovanni, shaking his head.

"Maybe he's just having an off day," Ivy suggested.

Giovanni sighed again. "Aren't we lucky he only has seven a week?"

"Oh, he isn't so bad," said Ivy. "He had driving lessons for you last year."

"For _me_? He had driving lessons for Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana," he said. "Maybe for Vivienne Westwood I can have him know his three times tables by September..."

Eventually he went to make a phone call to get Adam and Irwin back on land. Charming though they were, Delilah was a little intimidated by Adam's parents. They were really nothing more to her than rich and beautiful strangers. Just their accents, just the size of them was enough to lily her liver. Giovanni was about the same height as Adam, but broader and sturdier; Adam was lean and sort of wiry. Ivy was tall and graceful, but with broad clothes-hanger shoulders that kept her from looking wispy. Next to her refined slenderness, Delilah felt curvaceous to the point of vulgarity or fetish; she liked her body, really, but the magazines dedicated to figures like hers were not known for their sophisticated audience.

When Giovanni returned he asked her polite questions about pokémon, and her badge-collecting. "Well, I was a gym leader once, you know," he said. "There's plenty of room at the top."

Ivy smiled wryly. "But there's even more room at the bottom, isn't there?"

"I make my business by being infallible," said Giovanni. "Anything short of infallibility leaves one either dead or in prison, neither of which is acceptable, I think you'll agree."

Delilah got the feeling that Giovanni was trying to gauge how much Adam had told her; she thought about just coming right out and saying everything she knew to save him the trouble, but then she thought that would be awkward so she didn't.

Just then there was a loud, haughty voice reading an uppity hotel employee about her attitude and arguing about the definition of "resort casual".

"That sounds like my loving son," said Ivy.

Giovanni sighed, "Large as life, and twice as noisy."

Staring was rude, of course, but it seemed like a special case when Adam walked into a room. Adam's walk was a slither, a sidewind, and a sashay; Adam's walk confirmed everybody's greatest fears; Adam's walk showed how little he cared about anyone or anything except what he wanted. Adam walked as if he were the only person in the world. Adam walked so nobody had to guess exactly who he was. Adam walked like he had options. His hips moved like there was something there, a drapion's telson, or a houndoom's pointed tail. It was undulatory locomotion, it was ten pounds of sex in a five-pound box.

"Why, Adam!" said Giovanni, not quite affected by his physical charms the same way Delilah was. "Is that any way to show up for lunch?"

Adam looked indignant as he and Irwin took their seats flanking Delilah, both of them slightly beat up and slightly drunk as apparently there was a stocked bar on the yacht. "I came through the door this time," he said. "What way would you have preferred?"

Giovanni raised an eyebrow. "You're hardly the most appetising thing I've seen today," he remarked.

"Did you boys come to a truce?" asked Ivy, regarding Irwin kindly.

Neither of them said anything.

"No?" asked Giovanni. "No end in sight, for your enmity?"

"Enmity?" repeated Adam, his eyebrows shooting upward. "Is that what we've got? Have we got enmity?"

"Of course you've got enmity. What did you think?"

"Well, I knew I couldn't stand him, but I didn't know we had enmity."

"Trust me," said Irwin. "We have enmity."

"With enough left over afterward for some hatred," said Giovanni. "Something of a waste of energy, don't you think?"

Neither of them said anything.

"I think it's a good idea, a truce," he continued. "A peace treaty seems to be on order. How about it?"

"Well, it's okay with me," said Irwin, and put out his hand across Delilah's chest, which suddenly seemed invasively massive. "Want to shake on it?"

Adam recoiled from Irwin's hand, looking slightly nauseated. "Don't push it," he warned him through a Billy Idol lip curl.

"Adam, really!" said Ivy. "Stop showing off. You don't need to be rude."

"Well, we're not _friends_," he said. "We're just not practising enemies."

"No, but you'll do until one comes along, won't you," she said in a horrible accusatory tone of crucifying motherly disappointment.

"Yeah, Adam," said Irwin, spurred on by the support of Adam's parents. "I don't think you're capable of human emotion."

Adam rolled his eyes.

"You're about as sympathetic as a brick wall," Irwin continued. "I don't think you know what it means to be sad or happy. All you are is angry."

"And here I thought anger was an emotion," said Adam.

"You can't love," Irwin concluded. "You're like a robot, or Voldemort."

"Just because I don't love _you_ doesn't mean I can't love," said Adam. "Just because I choose not to—watch."

He picked up his spoon and looked tenderly into his reflection.

"He walks in beauty—like the night," he recited, meeting with scornful laughter.

"You look in the mirror so much I'm not surprised you see everything backwards," said Giovanni.

As they ate Delilah tried to pick out which features Adam had inherited from either of his parents. Giovanni's features were clearer and slightly heavier, seeming to have added a certain depth and definition to Ivy's English rose prettiness with appealing results. She could only imagine how beautiful Adam might have been had he been born a girl (not that she was going to complain).

"So, I was wondering," said Delilah, "while we were on the boat, I was wondering, what exactly does 'ahoy' mean?"

"It's just how they tell each other to watch out, to beware," said Ivy.

"Oh." She had been hoping that it had a more exciting etymology. "Well, I'm going to go to the bathroom," she said, scooting out her chair.

"I am, too," said Adam, standing up.

"Uh-oh," said Giovanni. "Ahoy, Delilah! Ahoy!"

Adam told him to shut up; he just laughed, in that annoying way that parents did when they found their children's feelings amusing. Irwin looked unhappy.

"So fucking annoying," Adam muttered to her when they were out of earshot.

Delilah laughed abusively; she didn't really think that Adam was in the right.

"But, after all," he conceded, "that dress really does something for your anatomy."

"Thanks..."

"And mine, too."

Adam was being very weird and flirty. He had said things like this before, but never quite so much; she figured it was probably just to make Irwin mad.

"So, Delilah," said Ivy when she rejoined the table, "I hear you're entering the Pokémon League Championship Tournament this month."

"Yeah, I am," she said, sitting down.

"Have you entered before?"

"No, I haven't."

"Well, I wish you luck," she said.

"There's no such thing as luck," said Adam abruptly. "When opportunity knocks, you either answer it or you don't. That's it."

"You have to believe in bad luck, Adam," said Giovanni. "People who run into you are loaded with it."

"Shut up," spat Adam.

Both his parents looked irritated. "Have a little respect, Adam," Ivy warned him slowly. "You're in public..."

"Delilah hardly needs luck anyway," Irwin bragged slavishly.

"Oh, really?" Ivy looked amused. "Is she very good?"

"She's the best!" he said with total conviction. "She never loses."

It did bother Delilah a little bit to be praised in third person, but she felt more embarrassed for Irwin than for herself. "Oh, shut up, Irwin," she said, laughing awkwardly. "Of course I've lost before."

Next to her, Adam's face soured tremendously, and it came as sort of a shock to her: she had forgotten why and just how much he hated her (and maybe he had, too).

"Don't be modest," he sneered nastily, goring a tomato on his fork.

"And just what is the matter with you?" asked Ivy.

He didn't reply, moodily massacring his food while Delilah looked at her plate uncomfortably.

"Too many things to count, apparently," Ivy accurately answered her own question.

"You know what—!" Adam looked at her, and then at his father, and then he turned on Delilah and kissed her furiously.

"Heyyy!" she said, fighting him off. "What are you doing...!" Unfortunately she ended up not sounding very powerful because she was laughing in a combination of embarrassment and ticklishness.

"I just drank a whole glass of passion fruit soda," Adam panted in explanation, more to his parents than to her.

Irwin's mouth dropped open.

"Are you _kidding_ me?" he asked. "That's just a _name_!"

"I just thought I'd let that 'power of suggestion' have a go at me," he said.

Irwin gazed stupidly at him. Delilah didn't look much smarter.

"Adam."

Giovanni's voice was quiet, even, and dangerous; his face was composed but his dark eyes burned like hot coals.

"You have publicly humiliated me for the last time."

"Gianni," said Ivy firmly. "Please. Non cominciare a fare una scenata, I really don't—"

To her consternation, he ignored her, staring at Adam; his eyes looked like they were going to peel at the edges. "Why do you think you can behave this way? Don't you think you _embarrassed_ someone?"

Adam threw his spoon on the table; it clinked with a comical lack of drama against his glass of ice and skidded across the table into his mother's lap. "Oh, shut up, Daddy!"

"Oh, you _try_ my patience, Adam," Giovanni seethed.

"I'd love to," said Adam, standing up. "I've hardly got any of my own."

"Um, I'm going to go to the bathroom," said Irwin, leaving in an awkward hurry. That was a good idea, but Delilah had just gone a few minutes ago and it would look dumb if she did it too.

Giovanni watched him go, and then looked back at Adam. "Sit down, Adam."

"No! And I know you're upset!"

"I don't get upset," said Giovanni, looking intensely dignified. "I get paid."

"You're no better than a bit of pockmarked strumpet!"

"Adam, sweetheart," Ivy warned him. "Non dare spettacolo. We're not at home."

"Any agenda is prostitution, Adam," Giovanni hissed unblinkingly. "Now sit down and don't dare speak to me like that again."

Somehow they started yelling at each other. Quite quickly Giovanni switched to Italian, and Adam followed suit. Only Adam would use "pockmarked strumpet" in complete seriousness. She understood that he was a little bit drunk and she understood that he was having a passionate argument with his father but she thought it was all a bit histrionic. Ivy looked very tired. Delilah continued eating as some of the restaurant's employees attempted to calm Adam down. It was better than probably any movie they might have gone to see.

At some point Adam seemed to realize that Giovanni had switched to Italian to preserve some privacy, so he went back to English, louder and clearer than before.

Giovanni said, "You blame me for everything!"

"And whose fault is that?" Adam shouted. "That's how you like it!"

He turned to make a dramatic exit, only to find his path blocked by a freshly bathroomed Irwin, who had been watching in slack-jawed horror.

"Get out of the way, rinderpest," snarled Adam.

There was a chorus of "tsk!" and "Adam!" and "be nice!" and other disapproving sounds from his parents that gave Irwin courage.

"Don't be so mean," he said, his hands on his hips.

Adam's sneering mouth twisted disparagingly. He was dirty and wrathful, sunburned and indomitable, and in that moment he somehow gave the illusion of becoming larger, like a fur-raising tomcat hissing and spitting sideways at the opposition.

"I _said_, GET OUT OF THE WAY!"

"Okay," said Irwin, stepping aside.

Adam shoved past him, twisted around, and shouted, "I'm the nicest fucking slag you're ever going to meet!"

Then he stormed out of the restaurant, flipping over a table on his way.

His parents immediately set to the task of mollifying the gathered employees, Ivy with charisma and Giovanni with cash.

The temper tantrum was almost awe-inspiring. It was like watching _Real Housewives_, but worse because it wasn't for a camera.

Ivy touched Irwin's shoulder and asked, "Are you all right, darling?"

"I'm fine," he said.

"I'm so sorry about him."

"He was probably too upset to know what he was doing," said Irwin nobly.

One of Giovanni's thick eyebrows lifted an elegant millimeter. "Don't bet on it," he said.

"He probably doesn't mean to be mean," said Irwin. "He's just...probably insecure. And sad."

Giovanni laughed without smiling. "Adam _never_ does anything he doesn't mean. And what he usually means," he said, "is to be mean."


	12. I'm Stranded

**12 (I'm) Stranded**

On the first day of the Silver Conference Delilah's eyes cracked open painfully when her roommate sneezed extremely loudly. All the entrants were housed in a large, multistory pokémon center at Mt Silver, in eastern Johto. It was the day of the pre-screening, when they would all participate in a series of one-on-one matches to determine who would advance to the semi-finals. Her roommate just happened to be one of her favorite people in the world, Art Christiansen.

"Excuse me," he said after he sneezed.

It was too early to talk, so she just rolled over. Besides, if she reacted at all it would only encourage him. He had sneezed like that before, in the Goldenrod Gym, and everyone had laughed, and he had gotten that weird self-conscious attitude of a little kid who was showing off by doing things that weren't actually impressive.

She heard him get up and go into the bathroom and turn on the shower, so she had nothing to do until he finished except get dressed and then sit on her bed staring at the painting of a rapidash and waiting for him to come out.

Eventually he opened the door so she could come in and use the sink. There were two sinks in a counter, so she wasn't sure why the building designers had not further accommodated communal living by partitioning the bathtub or toilet. He was wearing one of his race t-shirts.

"Are you ready for today?" he asked her as she was putting in her contact lenses and he was shaving.

She shrugged, still too dazed and confused to articulate anything too complicated.

"I wonder how tough it's going to be," he mused, obviously at a higher plane of consciousness than she was.

"Who knows," she said, venturing bravely into the world of the speaking.

"I'm just going to go for type advantages," he said.

She laughed, because she thought he was joking.

"You should, too," he said. "It's really the only way to do it."

She stopped mid-cosmetics, and looked at him sideways. "Wait, are you serious?"

"What do you mean, am I serious?" he said. "I always go for type advantages against gym leaders, it's the best way."

She stared at him for a minute, still unable to tell if he was kidding or not.

"Don't you like having a type advantage?" he said.

"Well—I mean, they're _nice_, sure, but that can't be the extent of your strategy? It's only going to get you so far."

"But it's the best way," he said again. "Just switch in a pokémon that's got a type advantage."

"But if everybody did that, you'd never have a match. You'd just have two people switching out their pokémon, in a continuous loop."

"You mean you don't switch out your pokémon when you're at a type disadvantage?"

"No, I think that's stupid," she said. "It's a cliché. I think it's too literal."

"Too literal? What does that mean?"

"It's way too obvious, it's so completely...middlebrow."

She thought this was quite an insult, but he didn't get it anyway. "Middlebrow?" he echoed, and laughed.

"I just think it's stupid," she said, too tired and too irritated for anything but bluntness as she went back to her eye make-up. "I think it's ignorant."

"But it _works_," he said. "Delilah, this is _pokémon_. That's what it's _about_."

"Pokémon isn't about anything, Art," she said. "It's nothing. Pokémon doesn't mean anything, it's pointless. None of it matters."

He laughed in skeptical confusion. "What? How can you even say that?" he said. "You won eight badges on your first damn try."

"So why should I listen to you?"

He shrugged blandly at her groggy bitchery and went back to the mirror.

There were lots of vendors set up around the courts, for the trainers and the spectators; Delilah wandered around them while trainers were called to courts over the PA system for the screening matches. Because of the number of entrants, it was a while before Delilah was called to a court; when she got there, the previous match was still running, and she leaned against the fence eating a burrito until her opponent came up, who was an older man. He put out his hand and said, "Nice to meet you!"

"You, too," she said, shaking his hand. Delilah was never sure how long to shake somebody's hand, or how long to look at them, or smile. Somehow this problem worked itself out and at some point they were no longer shaking hands.

"So how old are you?" he asked.

"I'm eighteen."

"Really! You're very young. Have you entered before? Are you in school?"

"No, this is my first time entering. I graduated high school last year."

"Of course, Red was hardly in long pants when he won," he said.

"Sure, but...he was really great. I mean, he's certainly not the average..."

"Oh, sure, he was really something special," he agreed. "You heard all kinds of nasty rumors about him after he got so far, but even if some of them were partly true, I think he really was a special boy..."

"How about you?" asked Delilah, taking the initiative to make small talk. "How long have you been training pokémon?"

"Longer than you have, let's put it that way!" He laughed, his eyes crinkling up pleasantly.

Before the match they had to run their pokémon through a few basic obedience tasks, which was a subtlety of pokémon training often overlooked: besides battling, animals were trained for practical purposes, and it was important that they could be trained to lie still in case they ever needed medical attention; for example, if an animal needed a shot or a check-up, it had to be able to obey a command to lie still long enough to be attended. Similarly, a pokémon had to be trained to realize when it no longer wished to battle, and to communicate such to its trainer (or a judge, or the opponent). As in any sport, serious injuries were caused by accidents, mistakes, or sloppiness, and were never the intention or the norm.

Many people maintained that the reason people (and especially women) liked to have pets was to have an outlet for parental instincts. Perhaps this was true for some, but Delilah was quite sure that she had no maternal instincts to speak of. Delilah was not interested in forging emotional bonds with animals or with humans, and she felt no desire to care for something helpless, which perhaps spoke poorly of her self-confidence.

Relationships with other humans were almost uniformly disappointing to Delilah; they made her anxious because of the possibility of misinterpretation. The vast majority of people Delilah had met in her life had trouble following her train of thought, and she was quite more comfortable with pokémon because she never had to explain. Also they were cuter.

Delilah just thought everyone was really boring, and she wasn't sure why. She never wanted to go to parties or clubs or anything because she always just got bored. Why was that? Why was she so arrogant? Why did she look down on practically everybody she ever met? Why didn't she think it was fun to ingest down-market ethanol while men huffed poppers and girls yanked up the tops of their strapless imitation Herve Leger to a soundtrack of Mason vs Princess Superstar vs sweet, sweet desperation? Why did she only enjoy normal people and their company ironically?

Later that afternoon she stood in the atrium of the pokémon center with Gabrielle Varnham, watching the screen above the front desk to see if they got in.

"Well, the moment of truth," said Gabrielle. "I don't think I made it; I only won one of them..."

Delilah suddenly felt like kind of a total bitch for winning all of her matches, so she didn't say anything.

"Winning one out of three is like getting a thirty-three percent, that's like an F, isn't it?" asked Gabrielle as photos and names started to blip onto the screen.

"Well, they don't just judge you on whether you win or lose," said Delilah. "They're only one-on-one matches, and that wouldn't be fair if you got a type disadvantage. They look at your technique and your conditioning too."

"Yeah, well," she said, scanning the screen as names appeared. "Oh, Delilah! Look! You're in the semi-finals!"

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, look!" she said, pointing to the photo from Delilah's training license that now showed up on the screen. "It's in alphabetical order. There it is, Peerenboom. I'm pretty sure you're the only one of those."

"Oh. That's cool," said Delilah, not sure what else to say.

"That's _cool_?" Gabrielle repeated, laughing. "That's all you're going to say? It's okay to be excited!"

"You're hurting my feelings, Gabrielle. I'm sorry my behavior is so inappropriate. Your opinion means a lot to me."

She laughed. "Yeah, I can tell."

"Well, there's you, right?" asked Delilah, pointing to Gabrielle's name and photo on the screen. "Varnham, Gabrielle. You did so get in."

"Phew!" she said, pretending to wipe sweat from her forehead.

"You've entered before, haven't you?"

"Yeah, I did, I entered last year."

"Did you place?"

"No. I didn't make it past the screening last year."

"Oh." Delilah wasn't sure what to say; she hoped it didn't sound like she was being snobby or condescending.

"I figured," said Gabrielle, "that if I didn't get past the screening this year, I'd have to reevaluate what I'm doing..."

"What, like, give up pokémon?"

"Well, no, but if I'm not getting better, you know, maybe it's not what I should be doing."

"Oh."

"I might do that anyway, though. I always thought it would be neat to study veterinary medicine."

"Yeah? That sounds cool. Being a pokémon trainer would probably even help you with that."

"Yeah, that's what I figure. I thought I could work in a pokémon center."

Delilah felt sort of inadequate in this conversation; what was she going to do after the tournament was over? Was she going to keep training pokémon? She supposed so; what else could she do? Get a real job? Go to school? But she was good at training, so why shouldn't she keep doing it?

She didn't have anything better to do.

Maybe Irwin was on to something, she thought as she lay in bed that night under the rapidash painting. Maybe she should be more like Adam. She could be aggressive and domineering and take whatever she wanted, and damn the consequences! She could be a pirate! Win if you can, lose if you must, but always cheat! That sounded pretty great, to go for it and get whatever she wanted.

But what did she want?

That was the problem. Theoretically it sounded good, but it only made sense if she had an actual goal. But Delilah had no real desires, in either the short- or long-term. If her only ambition was to be ambitious, well that just presented all kinds of problems. It was like time travel or an impossible figure. It just didn't work that way.

Did she want to win the tournament? Well, not particularly...of course she wanted to do well—after all, it was a reflection of her abilities as a trainer—but winning wasn't the reason she was there. It would have been foolish besides: this was the first time she had ever entered. Many people entered several years in a row and probably never even got past the screening, like on the _American Idol_ auditions, so it would have been silly of her to expect to win. Yes, she was very good at pokémon training, but everybody else there was, too: everybody there had defeated at least eight gym leaders. Just like she had. It was a pretty even footing.

She won anyway.

"Hello everyone, we're now back from the intermission; if you're just tuning in, this is the Pokémon League California State Championship Tournament. As it stands, Delilah Peerenboom, on green, and Aidan Eld, on red, have both defeated three of each other's pokémon."

"Delilah, an early favorite in the competition, comes to us as Johto County Champion. She's good with pokémon and not bad without them, either..."

"Aidan is the Champion of San Luis Obispo County, apparently named after St Aidan of Lindisfarne."

"Really? What was he the saint of?"

"Firefighters, if I'm not mistaken."

"Well, that's an interesting note, now as we see Aidan with his flygon, still fresh after battling Delilah's delcatty before the break; so how is Delilah going to counter that...?"

"Well, Tim, since you asked me, it looks like she's sending out a furret."

"You know what, Dave, I think you're right."

"It shows off a little—very good-looking animal there."

"So, there's a Sand-Attack from the flygon, followed by Supersonic, yikes."

"You know, Tim, I have to say I think I have a pathological fear of flygons—wow!"

"Quite a hit there. You know, Dave, this is your first pathological fear I can really get behind."

"You're a jerk, Tim. Ooh! That's frustrating."

"Screech—not nice. But there's a lucky Slam."

"There's a neat maneuver on the part of the flygon. Delilah gets in a Sucker Punch, that's clever too."

"Very clever. Could Delilah be pulling up the lead?"

"Well, Tim, I have no idea. There's a nice hit with Quick Attack..."

"And Aidan takes advantage of the situation with DragonBreath. Apparently, Aidan's flygon is named Lucky, because after his mother laid the eggs, his broke a little bit early."

"Lucky's mother or Aidan's mother?"

"Oh, shut up. And Delilah's furret is named Snoops. Cute name."

"Right you are, Tim. Back to the matter at hand, Delilah decides to go for another Slam..."

"She seems confident that she can withstand whatever Aidan throws at her in the meanwhile. Furrets certainly are cute, aren't they?"

"Right again, Tim. Very cute, but they sure are mean."

"They're very intelligent, though. Supposedly they can understand how locks work. I've heard they're probably as smart as infernapes."

"Oh, really? I didn't know that. So there's that same Sucker Punch again; and in quick succession we have Fury Swipes as Aidan tries unsuccessfully to—oh! Is it—is it out?"

"It's out. Aidan deliberates on his next choice. What's it going to be?"

"I couldn't tell you, Tim."

"And it's...a...rhydon! Coming in right away with Fury Attack."

"Solid attack. Delilah tries a Defense Curl."

"Ouch!"

"Ouch? Nothing happened..."

"No, I—I hit my hand on the..."

"Oh, for Christ's sake, Tim! First you're asking me what are they going to do next, _as if I know_, and then you're a jerk to me about my completely justified fear of giant insects, and now you're ruining the sound equipment. I could really do without this, you know."

"Well, Dave, you know, you're not paid to talk about me and you."

"Is this where I say I'm hardly paid at all?"

"Meager or no, Dave, our stipends come in because of our battle commentary skills."

"Meager or no, right?"

"Meager skills in my case, no skills in yours."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah."

"So there's Rock Blast from the rhydon...nice..."

"You know, Tim."

"...Yes, Dave?"

"Sometimes I wonder if anybody even listens to us."

"At this point, I sincerely hope not."

"I mean, how necessary are we? Seriously?"

"You could have been somebody, Dave. You could have gone to New York City and you could have been somebody."

"I could have."

"But instead you're slaving as a pokémon battle commentator. There are worse ways to put bread on the table, Dave."

"Thanks, Tim, I feel better. Thanks for guiding me through this tough time."

"It's all I'm here for, apparently."

"Oh, Tim. I didn't mean to suggest that nobody listens to you."

"Yes, well, I don't appreciate the implication."

"You're my life coach, Tim."

"Well, _anyway_..."

"Yeah, anyway."

"Throughout that Delilah has brought in her togekiss, but the rock moves are super effective now."

"She shrugs it off...and there's a beautiful Extrasensory..."

It wasn't even like she tried that hard. She thought she probably didn't deserve the State Champion title; she didn't work herself to the bone, she hadn't even particularly wanted to win. Her pokémon were in admittedly high form, but it wasn't like she was a slave driver. She just took care of them; she didn't do anything special, so why did everyone think it was such a big deal?


	13. Why Can't I Be You?

**13 Why Can't I Be You?**

There were two photos of Adam, mugging for the camera like Brian Slade as painted by Gil Elvgren, drunk and wearing six-inch Versace stiletto platforms but moving nevertheless with the ease and fluidity of someone who had sex eight days a week; underneath it said, "The camera adds ten pounds precisely where it's least necessary—in the case of body divine **Adam Harlow**, 21, it's his ego!"

He was at a party attended by his father, for high-profile members of the Pokémon League; a disdainful Agatha Keen, formerly of the Elite Four, looked on with brows pursed and lips furrowed. How typical that Adam only now showed up in an American tabloid, now that he had left the country. It was really quite disgusting that he could afford to buy a pair of $900 women's shoes to wear once as a joke.

Her intention in showing this to Irwin was just to maybe have a bit of a catty laugh at Adam's expense and say something like "never, ever drunk" and then move on with their lives.

Instead, Irwin took it horribly seriously. "He's the biggest idiot on the face of the planet," he sneered bitterly. "You know why girls like him so much?"

She certainly did know why girls liked him so much, but she wasn't about to say so to Irwin.

"It's because he doesn't give a shit," Irwin answered himself. "He plays it cool. He doesn't care. Why, that stupid photogenic big-nosed JERK doesn't even like girls! He's bored of them, he's desensitized. Those pretty boys only have eyes for themselves."

"Yeah, well."

"I know I'm not the best-looking guy in the world," said Irwin, "but I'm sure you've gone out with worse-looking guys than me, right?"

Delilah wasn't sure what to say. There were so many things wrong with what Irwin had just said, not least of which was the presumption that she regularly dated ugly boys.

Irwin looked at her. "I said, I'm sure you've gone out with worse-looking guys than me," he repeated. "Haven't you, Delilah?"

She hadn't. She pretended to think very hard and said, "Um...hmm..."

He laughed dutifully, but immediately said, "Really, though."

"Irwin..." She sighed, unsure what to tell him. "I hope I haven't given you the wrong impression," she said carefully.

He looked at her. "What do you mean," he said tonelessly.

She found it hard to look at him. "No offense," she said, "but...I have _no_ interest in dating..."

"Except for Adam, right?" he said, still weirdly flat. "You do have interest in dating Adam, don't you?"

She blinked. "What? What does...?"

"You do, right?" he said relentlessly. "You like him? You probably want to screw him, like every other girl in the world?"

She made a face of confusion mixed with slight derision in an attempt to convey the fact that she wished not to talk about it. "I don't see how that involves you," she said. "I mean, sorry if I'm no longer worth your friendship, but the activity of my libido is really none of your business..."

He looked scornful. "I can't believe you like him, Delilah," he said. "He's just a huge boner that's developed cognitive thought. Actually, I can totally believe you like him! Five million lays can't be wrong, right?"

"Irwin, shut up," she said, rolling her eyes. "I'm not going to apologize. And who said I like him? I hate him, but that doesn't stop him from being good-looking—"

He made an indignant noise, but dropped it.

Was that how Irwin saw her? Somebody confusing physical urges for romance, overlooking the fact that what she wanted was right in front of her all along? She didn't think she was being deluded about it. It wasn't like she thought Adam would be a great boyfriend. Did Irwin just assume that she wanted a steady relationship? She could see how it would be annoying for Irwin, that she would effectively say, "I don't mind kissing Adam, but I would never want to date him." Did that make her a slut? Was that such a bad thing to be?

What did Irwin think he could offer her in a romantic relationship that would be any different from their current friendship? Was romance just a fancy word for friendship with a sexual overtone? Is that what it came down to? Or was Delilah missing something? Was there something wrong with her? Was she something cold and emotionless, who could appreciate friendship and sex but could not comprehend the idea of romantic love being more than a combination of them?

It wasn't Irwin's fault, but Delilah was not attracted to him. He was not ugly or even badly-dressed, but she had no desire to interact sexually with him, so why should she have to argue her own taste? If she were ever to have sex, it would be with somebody she was sexually attracted to, because that was just logic. And of course it wasn't Irwin's fault that Adam made everybody else look like clumsy bags of impotence, but it wasn't Delilah's fault either. Even if she did have a crush on Adam, she didn't think she was stupid enough to believe that it was less than 97% sexual.

In June when she was in New York for the nationals she realized for the first time that it was an actual possibility for her to win the whole thing. The chance had always been there, but being on an entirely different coastline where the states were smaller and the cities were older it dawned on her that she was one of the top trainers in one of the biggest countries in the world. How had that happened? She hadn't had to struggle with prejudice or a dead mother or bitter winters or slavery or poverty; why did she deserve it?

"...We know it's been a journey," said the speaker, an older man who had been the US Champion in 1984. "The League has been with you every step of the way. There are many more gyms and pokémon centers now than there were twenty-five years ago, which really opens up communication between trainers and the League..."

He had been talking for ten minutes.

"...This year marks the 104th anniversary of the International Pokémon League"—Delilah applauded hollowly with the rest of the stadium—"and it has grown so much over the decades, since its inception, with the Kanto Indigo League still functioning today..."

It was so boring that Delilah had an out-of-body experience.

"...Today there are Leagues from Libya to Lebanon, and as we continue into the future the Pokémon League hopes to continue increasing communication with its registered trainers so we can help you be the best trainers you can be..."

Delilah glanced around at the other state champions and yawned, not caring too terribly much if a camera passed over her at that moment.

"...It's really wonderful how involved the League is with its trainers as individuals," he continued remorselessly. "When you laughed, we laughed. When you cried..."

"We laughed," Delilah said in a low voice to the boy next to her.

He laughed. "Shut up," he muttered, but he was smiling.

At the end of the month she went to the Johto County Fair on her sister's eleventh birthday, where she had a rather horrible time thanks very much because she only went on one ride for an outrageous price of six tickets per person where her dress blew up and she broke a fingernail. The ride was built to resemble lady wrestlers somehow and the operator actually had to dictate where everybody sat because whenever someone stepped onto it the whole thing shook.

The only thing she had wanted to see at the fair were the animals, but even though she had somehow heard a phantom ampharos bleating in her ear for ten minutes and could clearly smell the presence of farmyard animals, she ended up being dragged around the art and collection exhibits for two hours, and at the end of the day her legs hurt and she had a sunburn across her shoulders and the tops of her breasts.

How unlikely was it, she wondered, for her to have become American Champion and defeated the Elite Four? Well, she figured, "unlikely" was still a chance. In any given match that didn't draw, there would be a winner. Then that winner would face another winner and in that match between winners one of those winners would win again, and so on. Out of fifty State Champions, plus Puerto Rico and DC, one of them would become the National Champion after not losing once. It was equal opportunity, as much hers as anybody else's.

Nevertheless, she couldn't help but think that it was sort of meaningless for her to keep winning. If her life were a film, a TV show, a young adult novel—it would be important. What if she beat someone who had been training for years and years because he always dreamed of being the best trainer in the world because his dead relative was a pokémon trainer, and he had to struggle to get out of his parasitic old-fashioned middle American town and then he had to battle racism as well as pokémon and it was all very symbolic and epic on his journey toward achieving his singular goal in the world which was the only thing keeping him going.

And then she beat him. Delilah was just a lucky white girl who liked shoes and lipstick and entered the competition because she had nothing better to do. Her life couldn't be a book or a movie because it just didn't matter to her. It wasn't a good story because she didn't care.

She won anyway.

She was Pokémon League International Champion, and if she beat Lance Siegfried she would be the new World Champion. Why did this keep happening? It wasn't that she didn't _want_ to win, but it didn't make any sense. Delilah wasn't a naïve tomboy who was secretly in love with her best friend's brother or her brother's best friend. She didn't dream desperately about being a pokémon master or even a lawyer or doctor or teacher or something. She had to doubt that Irwin would one day rescue her from a burning stable because her soul was calling to him after they ate pizza and the melting cheese got stuck together as a symbol of their hearts yearning for each other and she realized she was in love with him all along but had been afraid of ruining their friendship because it would change everything.

Delilah didn't have a special story about courage or loyalty or hope or strength or pride or compassion or spirit or dreams or love. All she had was talent, and it meant nothing to her. Was that supposed to mean that she couldn't accomplish anything? Was she too stoic, too different, too unlikely to be an important character? It seemed that an acceptable heroine would be of middling skill, but make up for it in heart. She would be average, innocent, and plain, so the majority of viewers could relate in some way, but she would be sweet and lovable and have good intentions and admirable ideals so that in the end she would save the day, learn the lesson, snag the cute guy.

Why was Delilah different? She was talented, smart, and pretty. Was that unrealistic? Did that deprive her of a happy ending? Was she barred from success by merit of an improbable and unsympathetic cup size? Was she supposed to be left unsatisfied, because other people couldn't relate to her?

"Do you want a drink?" Lance Siegfried asked her at the swanky brunch held the day before their match.

"Oh...I don't really drink," she said.

"Come on, you're old enough here," he said, smiling winningly. "Besides, it's your birthday today, anyway."

"I don't really need to be any stupider or clumsier than I am," she said.

He laughed, and handed her a mimosa. "You'll still be able to walk," he assured her.

It was the first time she had been on a plane by herself, coming to battle Lance in Kanto, the Pokémon League's historic center. The only people she actually knew at the party were Adam and his parents, but Adam gave her a weirdly chilly reception; it took her a little by surprise, since they hadn't left each other on particularly icy terms, but she reasoned that Adam was just moody like that. He was given a rather wide berth by the other guests, and Delilah noticed that Agatha Keen was not present.

She shrugged it off; there were a number of other people interested in talking to her anyway, although being the new kid on the block made her a little bit nervous. In attendance were a few present and past Elite Four and gym leaders, and it felt a little bit like they were measuring her up, judging her behind their Irish coffees.

"So how long have you been doing this?" asked a gym leader named Lt Surge. "You're just a kid, aren't you?"

"I've been collecting badges since last summer," she said. Over the past couple of months she had answered this question about five hundred separate times.

"About a year, huh?" asked the lieutenant, chewing on his cigar and examining her. "Just how much do you know about this little game, sweetheart?"

"Nothing," she said. "I'm only here because of a clerical error, so don't tell anyone 'cuz everybody thinks I'm great."

He laughed.

She did try talking to Adam, since he was the only person she really knew, but they just ended up sniping at each other about nothing and he went the usual route of challenging her to a pokémon match.

His Bloody Mary looked very boozy and grown-up next to her mimosa; in his eyes was the eerie ice of an emerald in a museum, and she became aware of feeling a certain revulsion.

"Okay," she agreed with intimidated lust.

She was getting kind of sick of pokémon matches but at least this one had the distinction of taking place behind a greenhouse instead of in front of cameras and thousands of people. When he lost he was very upset, and she almost felt bad until he sneered nastily at her that "I wouldn't expect you to understand".

She made a face of amused skepticism and said, "So you lost at pokémon—big fucking deal, Adam. What do you accomplish by being mad about it?"

"Hey, knock it off, Adam," called Lance, appearing suddenly. "Are you bothering her?"

Adam rolled his eyes. "Yeah, bothered," he said, watching him approach, suddenly aloof and remote.

Lance came up next to Delilah and frowned with mingled pity and disdain. "Would it kill you to show a little respect?"

Adam smirked and she wanted to wring his smug sleazy neck. "Probably not, but why run the risk?"

"You are really obnoxious, Adam," Lance observed objectively.

Adam's cool green eyes flicked over to Delilah. "You had better win tomorrow," he humphed, and slinked away.

They watched him go and she sighed exasperatedly, "I can't win."

"Don't let him get to you," said Lance, taking her literally. "He's just jealous, he just wants attention."

"Yeah, well." She shrugged. "I just meant I'm never right according to him."

"Just don't pay attention to him," he said. "You're a great trainer."

He patted her shoulder. She wasn't sure how to respond so she just said "thanks".

Delilah really didn't know what to think of her relationship with Adam; it seemed so anomalous. How many people in the world hated somebody like that? Plenty of people hated somebody, but they would never _say_ so. She had never known two people to be as outwardly antagonistic as she and Adam were to each other. That was something that happened in movies, and books, with the nice main character and the bitchy cheerleader captain. People weren't like that in real life...real people were passive-aggressive, and didn't want other people to know if they hated someone, because it made them look bad. Mean people generally had the "decency" to pretend they weren't mean when in front of others.

Her victory over Lance the next day was slightly overwhelming; there was a split second of silence before the crowd exploded. It was the single loudest thing she had ever heard. She didn't notice Lance had left his platform until he was standing below hers with a bouquet and a gentlemanly hand down, and she couldn't hear herself laugh.

At the reception after the match a woman who was apparently a long-time supporter of/donor to the Pokémon League clasped her hand and gushed, "How beautifully you battle! Look at you, you are so young and beautiful! Do you realise whom you're replacing? Those are big shoes to fill!"

"Well, yes, I mean, gosh, Lance is wonderful, I mean—"

"Oh, sure, I love Lance, he's very talented too, but you are _young_ and talented! It's thrilling to have such a young Champion again, and a girl!"

A girl.

She was the first girl World Champion.

She thought it was a little overzealous to say that she was "so young"—Lance was only in his twenties, so he wasn't that much older than she was—but was it really her sex that was the first thing people noticed when they saw her?

It seemed that way; almost every magazine article's headline referenced it in some way, the only exceptions being the ones in very dry pokémon magazines. The more mainstream the interview, it seemed, the more likely it would be prevailingly about her gender rather than her pokémon. Most of the world saw her as a girl trainer. She would not deny that that was what she was, but why was that qualifier necessary?

The reality was that as Pokémon League World Champion she felt quite stupid and inadequate. Not because she didn't think she deserved it, but because everyone seemed to expect her to have inclusive knowledge of pokémon history minutiae like, "What do you think of the Fucilerei Technique, made famous by the magnemite of Armando Cipriani, Pokémon League Champion of Italy and Malta, 1974?" or maybe, "I notice you have taught your dratini to use a variation of the Akvumi Maneuver, introduced by Taylor Roman, Pokémon League World Champion from 1934 to 1938, when executing Slam, the signature move of Roman's carnivine—given amphibians' metamorphosis process throughout life, do you think you will encounter a greater or lesser effectiveness in the future with this method?"

Delilah didn't mind these questions, and the people were usually very nice about explaining what they meant, since they were interested in her answers, but it really shook home the fact that she wasn't actually very interested in pokémon battling. She was very good at it and sometimes she knew what they were talking about, but she just was not a fanatic, and sometimes it made her feel like a hipstery inept dilettante. She didn't eagerly anticipate matches, her own or others', and in fact found pokémon battling quite boring to watch. It was like playing chess or putting together a jigsaw puzzle. These were fun activities but she would never want to watch them from the sidelines.

"It's not like I'm campaigning for women's rights or anything," she said in an interview. "I mean, female pokémon trainers I guess are a minority, but...it's a _sizable_ minority, and not an oppressed one. I mean, the thing is, women were never, like, barred from entering pokémon tournaments. You know? I'm not trying to like make a political statement."

"So, you think there is dramatisation at work?"

"Um, yeah. I mean, the Pokémon League has been in operation for a century, and there were never laws about who could or couldn't participate. Women could be registered trainers before they could vote. I mean, it would be _one_ thing if...say, there were legal restrictions on entering the League, and women weren't allowed, so I like dressed up as a boy and made a name for myself going through the championship process, and then when I was fighting Lance I stripped off all my clothes and, like, made a speech about menarche."

He laughed.

"But, if you missed it, I didn't," she said. "It's just that by coincidence there's never been a woman Champion before me. Pokémon training just attracts more men than women, so with more men in the pool, it's more likely that one of them will be the Champion."

"Why do you think pokémon training attracts more men than women?"

"Um...well, I don't know," she said. "I guess it could be any number of things. Social...norms, maybe. If a woman wants to have children I'm sure it makes it more difficult to take care of a full team of pokémon as well, because women biologically invest more in childbirth than men do. For full competition, I mean, a full team is six pokémon, and that's quite a lot of responsibility..."

_ Delilah Peerenboom, new World Champion and only just nineteen, has trained her pokémon with such attention to the very technical nature of pokémon battling, something which allows them each a lot of freedom to adapt moves to suit their specific personalities and skills, that each animal has a sort of clever individuality. Peerenboom herself calls attacks directly, which really seems like genius next to the delicate sophistication that comes from allowing her pokémon the freedom of being trained around the bare bones of a move._

_ There are many trainers whose style seems to be made up of a lot of pieces of other people's styles, by emulating those trainers they admire. Peerenboom's style is quite stripped and is therefore wholly her own, as her and her pokémon's personalities take form around the moves at their artistic minimum, rather than attempting to adjust a move's aesthetic complexity to better suit personal statistics..._

This, she thought, was a very pretty way of saying that she didn't care about pokémon at all.


	14. We Are All Prostitutes

**14 We Are All Prostitutes**

Since she was the freshly-minted Champion, Delilah's remaining days in the UK were a scattered mess of interviews and photoshoots. She wasn't sure if she preferred interviews about pokémon or about being a female role model; they both made her uncomfortable in their own special ways.

"So, you've got attention for the sort of purity of form that characterises your battling—how did this come about? Why did you decide to train your pokémon this way?"

"Well, I just don't really think it's, you know, necessary. And I think doing a lot of tricks is, like...um, sort of gratuitous. Like, I think sometimes it's, like, tacky, or..." She noticed the corner of his mouth twitch upward. "What is it?" she asked.

"Nothing," he said, waving his hand. "Go on."

"Okay...um, so like, I think some restraint in pokémon battles is, like...commendable. I don't remember who said it, but somebody said, like—"

He burst out laughing. "Like, like, like, like!" he said. "I have no trouble believing you're from California!"

He continued laughing for what felt like an awkwardly long time but was probably only a few seconds. She was taken quite aback, but she exaggerated it for him: "Oh my God, chill judgmental! Like, as soon as poss!"

He laughed, wiping tears from his eyes.

"You know," she said, "the only thing worse than someone who says 'like' too much is someone who points out when people say 'like' too much."

He laughed again. "You're probably right," he said. "Sorry about that. What were you saying?"

Did she say "like" too much? She did notice that people weren't saying things like "rad" and "for sure" and "I know, right?" as often as she was used to hearing; did she really say "like" and address people as "man" so much that it was that noticeable? Was it distracting? Did it make her sound dumb?

When Adam had been in Johto, he had been the one who was different; but when she was in Kanto, everybody else talked like he did, and she was the one with an alien speech pattern. Was she inviting stereotypes? Did she come across as a genderswapped Totally Kyle? The way Adam and his parents talked did make them sound more intelligent, she supposed; did the opposite apply to her? Alternately, was it a stereotype if it were true?

Besides, it wasn't as if saying "like" served no purpose—it made whatever she was saying less specific, more flexible. It wasn't totally filler. (Did she say "totally" too much?)

Being famous was kind of funny. There was a small flare-up of feminist outrage after she did a magazine photoset that took inspiration from old pulp novels and was sort of cheesecakey; Mr Driscoll, one of the men who were sort of like her press agents, shared numerous letters with her about how shameful it was for the first female Champion to be photographed like that, and how men invented high heels so women couldn't run away "when they rape you". There seemed to be a number of people who were disappointed that she wasn't a naïve tomboy with a hidden romantic side.

Still, she got fan mail anyway, so she didn't really care if people thought she should get a political breast reduction. She autographed a lot of photos of herself and even got paid to go to a jazz concert with Lance, solely so that people could look at them and take pictures. Lance was very nice to her, and let her fall asleep at the table because she was so tired from having her picture taken all week. She had a strange jazzy dream about a car made of Styrofoam and when she woke up there were red lines on her wrist from leaning on it.

As Champion, Delilah got to have her own room on RMS _Aqua_, which was an ocean liner with swimming pools and a battle court and a theater and who knew what else. It sailed transatlantic, from Vermilion in Kanto to Fort Lauderdale, Florida and through the Panama Canal to Olivine in Johto. In September it was leaving Olivine; in the meantime, she spent a few days chilling out at home.

Whitney invited her to lunch, with Morty and Eusine and Falkner, the Violet Gym Leader; she met them at a Greek restaurant in Cianwood.

Eusine stood at the table with his hands on his hips, looking down at his legs. "Do these jeans look weird?"

"What do you mean?" asked Whitney.

"I don't know, they're awkward," said Eusine, trying to look at himself from behind but failing. "I feel like they make my bum look really huge."

"Let me see," said Morty.

Eusine turned around.

"Yeah. Change right now. I will never be seen with you looking like that."

"But really though," said Eusine, stroking the denim in agitation. "It's so...I look low-class. I don't want my bum sticking out everywhere. People will make judgments about me..."

Falkner showed Delilah what he was drawing on his napkin. "This is how I feel right now," he said.

It was a person sitting on a toilet under clouds with lightning coming out of them; she burst out laughing.

"Must be the tzatziki," he said.

"I think it's the conversation," she said.

Later she went with Eusine and Whitney to look at the shops nearby while Morty and Falkner were grocery shopping.

"So, this cruise," said Whitney. "How long is it?"

"It's a couple weeks," said Delilah. "From here, to Florida, to England."

"Lucky you. How long are you going to be there, in England?"

"Well, I don't know, a couple months, at least, I think. I mean, there's still stuff I should do, like promotional stuff, that would be easier if I were over there. So, I'll talk to my guys, and see how long they want me there...and I'll check out some of the gyms there, too, you know."

"The gyms are brilliant," said Eusine, who was born in Celadon. "Best in the world. Kanto, that's where all the best trainers go eventually."

Delilah's Pokégear rang then; she looked at it, and saw Adam's name. "Hello?" she asked.

Adam didn't answer her; he was talking to somebody, so she waited: "...And so I figured out," he said, "that it wasn't necessary for me to continue attending classes. So they called my father and told him I was a troublemaker, which I was, but instead of letting me graduate early they gave me jobs like answering telephones and delivering notes."

"Hello?" she said again, but again he didn't answer.

"So, when I was nineteen I was in Italian _Vogue _after I spilt a Ruby Manhattan on the Astounding Mandi," he continued. "That was when my name in an editorial really had some novelty to it. Now, you know, I'm not new anymore, they've got used to me..."

There was a sort of broody pause, during which Delilah wondered whether or not she should hang up, and eventually somebody else said, "Hey, let me...yeah? Like that?"

Delilah listened for a moment, trying to figure out what was going on, and finally she realized: Adam's phone was in his pocket, and he was sitting on it wrong and had accidentally called her Pokégear while _somebody was sucking him off_.

She threw her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing as he moaned through his nose on the other end, and apparently he shifted his weight because then the call ended.

Eusine and Whitney had wandered deeper into the shop, and she went and found them.

"Ohmygod, you guys," she said. "I just got a phone call from Adam Harlow...?" She reenacted it for their entertainment. Eusine laughed uproariously, but Whitney shuddered delicately.

"He is so disgusting," she primmed. "I mean, sure, you're hot, so what? You don't have to be so weird and gross..."

Eusine rolled his eyes. "You know what your problem is, Whitney?"

"What?" challenged Whitney. "What is my problem?"

"You think you're too good for cocks."

"_What_?"

"You think you're above them."

"What does that even mean?"

"You think it's embarrassing to be aroused by a penis."

She gaped at him, shocked and incredulous.

"You're one of those girls who wants to be a lesbian just because you think penises are ugly."

"Eusine...you're an idiot," said Whitney. "Besides, penises _are_ ugly."

"It's not like vaginas are any less stupid-looking," Eusine continued. "The point is, you don't know what a good dick can do. Good dick can do anything. See, Delilah knows, she's got Adam Harlow's phone number."

Delilah stuttered, "Well, that's—I mean—"

"That's what he's famous for," said Eusine.

"Well, but I never slept with him, though," said Delilah.

"But you would, right?"

"Well, sure, I _would_..."

"Of course you would, you're only human," he said. "You would, I would, any sane person would."

"What are you saying?" said Whitney. "That I'm not human? That I'm insane?"

"Oh, pffft," said Eusine. "As if you wouldn't do sex with Adam Harlow."

"Are you kidding?" said Whitney. "Look how tall he is! He's, like, three times my size! He'd rip me in half!"

"Calm down, you guys," said Delilah. "It's not a big deal."

"Do you think Adam Harlow's is a big deal?" Eusine asked dreamily. "You've got the closest, Delilah, what do you reckon?"

"Well, I don't know, I mean, I never saw it before..."

"He _is_ tall," he mused throatily. "I wonder if it isn't like, you know, a fucking...donphan. Like, do you suck it or give it a peanut?"

Delilah burst out laughing.

"But maybe it's disappointing," he continued academically. "Maybe it's more like...a lightswitch. Maybe he's all talk. But, he's also quite slim, so maybe it's long but thin, like a length of dental floss. Oh, I'm dying of curiosity, Delilah, you've got to find out for me!"

"Eu_sine_!" exclaimed Whitney. "You can't just ask her to do that!"

"Why not? She said—"

"Delilah's not a total whore like you are."

Eusine laughed, looking surprised. "Ohoho! _Whitney_!"

"I wouldn't count on it anyway," said Delilah, trying to distract them from their disapproval of each other. "Really, I mean, Adam like really can't stand me."

"Really?" asked Whitney. "I thought he liked you. Irwin made it sound like Adam was super into you."

"Well, _men_," said Eusine with a limply dismissive hand gesture. "They love Delilah, don't they? Just look at her. See, Whitney, you can be attracted to somebody you don't like."

"Obviously," said Delilah. "I don't think anybody likes Adam."

Eusine laughed. Whitney said, "That's mean," but she was smiling.

Morty and Falkner came back to pick them up; in the car Falkner opened up the take-home box from the restaurant and said, "Mmm, who wants moussaka?"

"I bet it's still warm, too," said Delilah, and he laughed.

"Ugh, oh my God, get that out of my face," said Whitney, fanning the air.

"It's car-warm," he said, taking a bite. "Even better than oven-warm!"

"That spanakopita is making the car smell like puke," said Whitney, rolling down the window.

"Oh, don't exaggerate, Whitney," Morty chided her. "It just smells like...lasagna, and farts."

Eusine laughed explosively and Whitney said half-under-her-breath, "So it's just a typical day in Eusine's car..." Eusine smiled back at her mockingly.

At Whitney's house that evening they played a game called _Dream Star_, which was the kind of hopelessly girly talking fortune-telling game designed for ten-year-old sleepovers, and watched _This Is Spinal Tap_ while eating a gallon of ice cream. Adam called her back, wondering why her number was in his history when they hadn't spoken; he had had another mood swing, and was civil to her, maybe because they were only talking on the phone rather than in person. He told her that he had gone with his parents to Greece over the summer, where he "took a slash and a sleeping pill" and passed out without turning on the lights, and proceeded to detail the differences between "five"-star hotels across the continent.

Irwin had said it sarcastically, but maybe it was truer than he thought. Apprehensiveness in the face of the unknown was a universal human trait, and maybe it was attractive to her that a testimonial to Adam's sexual ability was so readily available. Maybe part of her attraction to him was just her being unadventurous. There was nothing understated about Adam's sexuality, but there was nothing very unconventional about it, either. Was Delilah so uncreative that it took someone of Adam's overwhelming sexiness to even get a second look from her? Was she too asexual to appreciate something subtler? There may as well have been an omnipresent flashing neon arrow pointed at his crotch. Everything he did was an advertisement; when she was around him she became very aware of her body (and his).

There was a sort of hypnotic contradiction about Adam: there was fiery sex, and there was icy chic. There was pampered prep and there was pugnacious punk. He was something of a snob, but he was too dumb to be pretentious; he clearly had problems, but he was too smart to be endearing. She wasn't even sure how to define their relationship: they knew each other too well to be acquaintances, but they didn't like each other enough to be friends. They weren't enemies, who actively sought each other out just for the sake of abuse; in fact at times they got along quite well. Delilah just couldn't be bothered with Adam, and really it was sort of liberating. It was sort of like having a tawdry affair, but on the opposite end of the relationship spectrum.

She had a couple of photoshoots in Cianwood and around Johto, so there would be pictures of her in her natural habitat for her fans, and then the night before the ship was leaving Olivine she attended a reception/press conference where Lance's name was removed from the Champion Suite and hers was put on, engraved in a golden poké ball like a star on a Hollywood dressing room.

Lance made a graceful little speech about how he wasn't sad that he had been defeated, and was happy to witness the rise of a new Champion, and then Delilah made a speech accepting his acceptance, and then they both stood there for questions.

"How nice is it to know that young girls can look up to you and feel confident about their dreams?"

Delilah had wanted to respond with "I don't understand the question" but unfortunately she understood it all too well. She pressed her lips together uncomfortably. "Um," she said. "I think that's a little arbitrary. Why couldn't they feel confident looking up to Lance or Red Ketchum or Gary Oak or any other Champion?"

"You don't think it's significant to be a woman in your position?"

"Well...no, I don't. I don't see why role models should be exclusive. Why can't boys admire me too?"

"Of course they can," said the reporter. "But you really don't think it's more meaningful because you're a woman?"

Delilah tried not to get mad. "No, I don't," she said shortly. "Is a boy's admiration for me less valuable than a girl's? I'm not trying to prove anything. All of my fans are equal, they all mean the same amount to me. Is a boy's admiration of me somehow inherently less powerful?"

"Well, I wouldn't put it _that_ way," the reporter insisted. "But it's reaffirming in a powerful way to see someone in a mutual minority achieving something big."

"I think that's patronizing," Delilah said candidly. "I don't want to be admired for being a woman. I want to be admired for being good at what I do. I mean...I know certain groups of people have made this big deal about, like, how much they hate me, because I wore a corset in a photoshoot. Like, I've never spoken to any of them, but I guess their reasoning is that the first female Champion is a female who is maybe, like, attractive to men in a very stereotypical way. But really, like...being made up into this massive female role model...I find that just as objectifying as walking down the street and getting stared at, probably even more so."

"Well, in that case," somebody else piped up, "how about your measurements?"

She rolled her eyes, and everybody laughed. "My measurements are large, small, and large," she said, and they laughed again.

Lance later hinted heavily to her that she didn't have to answer every question asked of her.

Well, it wasn't that important, anyway, she decided. It did make her a little mad; her sex had nothing to do with her pokémon, so she didn't think it should have had anything to do with the way people looked at them, but it wasn't really a big deal, in the end, and she couldn't do anything about it anyway.

Nevertheless, she was very excited about her gigantic suite on the cruise ship. Would it be more _Gentlemen Prefer Blondes_, she wondered, or _A Night at the Opera_? Or maybe like that _Baby-Sitters Club_ book she had read where they went on a cruise in the Bahamas and conveniently met eligible thirteen-year-old bachelors.

Hmm. Actually, hopefully not...


	15. Typical Girls

**15 Typical Girls**

If the best part of being Champion was the cruise ship, the worst part was getting up early to make public appearances once the cruise ended.

It was raining when she got her wake-up call at seven, and she lay there trying to choreograph the easiest way to get out of bed. Just sitting up was too hard; she rolled onto her side and then her front, and then she pressed her head onto the pillow and pivoted her body around that point, putting her feet on the ground and finally standing up straight.

Something Delilah noticed was that it was much rarer now for her to get roommates in pokémon centers. The employees and nurses seemed more courteous and afforded her much more privacy, so if she did have a roommate, it was never more than one at a time. She wondered if perhaps that was just how things were done in Kanto, where she found pokémon trainers were generally treated very well.

Having exhausted her ingenuity on getting out of bed, she brushed her teeth clumsily enough that she pinched her lip against her teeth, and accidentally spilled water on the floor. Somehow she managed to get dressed, although she didn't remember doing so as she threw on some make-up.

Eight o'clock came and went, and her car didn't show up; at first she was glad as she finished getting ready, but as she stood in front of the window, waiting for a car to pull into the pokémon center parking lot, she started to wonder if something was wrong, so she picked up the phone and dialed Mr Driscoll's office.

"Hello? Miss Peerenboom?" said his secretary. "Is there a problem?"

"Hi, well, I don't know, um...it's 8:15, and my car's not here yet?"

"8:15?" She laughed. "England's not near as big as California, love—it won't take _that_ long to get you there."

"Well—I thought it was coming at eight."

"Eight! No! I'm looking at the agenda and it shouldn't be there until 9:30—who told you eight...?"

That would just be typical. She sighed when she hung up the phone. Probably somebody would get fired for this. She had an hour, so she had Farley come out of his poké ball to walk to a café down the street. She didn't mind the rain, and he was intrigued by it. She didn't often bother eating breakfast, but even when she did she wasn't sure why it was the most important meal of the day. Besides, didn't that make lunch and dinner feel sort of bitter and insecure. But maybe she was hurting breakfast's feelings by not appreciating it more...

"Smile, Delilah!"

She looked up from her deep and meaningful thoughts and straight into a flash unit.

She blinked and laughed; the man with the camera smiled guiltily. "Sorry—I was actually taking pictures of the street, but I couldn't resist," he said. "I understand if you don't want me to release it."

"Oh," she said, blinking again. "That's all right, I don't mind. I don't know how much money it's worth, but feel free to sell it, as long as it's not incriminating."

He smiled. "Were you doing something incriminating?"

"Not to my knowledge, but you never know what'll offend people, do you?"

"Touch wood," he said. "If anything happens, just remember I did offer to get rid of it."

She laughed. "I don't think I'm famous enough for people to care that much, really," she said.

He looked at her skeptically. "You might be surprised. People care about weird things sometimes. I'm not a real paparazzo but I bet somebody's willing to pay for this," he said, indicating the camera.

She shrugged, unsure what to say.

"Well, it was nice meeting you," he said, extending his hand.

"Yeah," she said, shaking his hand. "Good luck. I'll try to be more famous for you."

"Thanks," he laughed as they parted.

Delilah got recognized on a daily basis, but she had always figured that that was just because she hung around pokémon centers and gyms and other places that would be heavily frequented by people who would know who she was. She wasn't really sure if the average person, who was not a pokémon trainer, would have any idea who she was; but on the other hand, Kanto was a place where pokémon training played a big part in local history, and she had also gotten more mainstream attention for her femaleness, so maybe it wasn't that strange. She had had the experience of being swarmed by paparazzi, but only in London or Los Angeles. It probably wasn't worth it for a paparazzo to come to Kanto, where the only surefire celebrities were pokémon trainers, about whom the average layperson probably cared rather little.

Finally the car came and took her to the hotel where she would be taking part in a lecture. The League was on an education kick currently; she and a few other popular trainers were going to be talking about typing and status ailments, and a little bit about operant conditioning.

The hotel lobby was very beautiful, as she and Mr Driscoll ran inside (the car was late, of course—two firings for the day so far) and she was immediately fallen upon by sheepishly aggressive pokémon trainers asking to shake her hand or something.

Lt Surge, who would also be lecturing, attempted to be helpful by waving his arms and shouting, "Ten o'clock! Ten o'clock! Ten o'clock, over here!"

The janitor smirked and said, "What time's the lecture, sir?"

"TEN O'CLOCK!" he said too loudly.

The more fans Delilah had, the crazier her schedule got. She and Mr Driscoll went to lunch with Lt Surge and a few businessy-type League men to make arrangements for a badge match; they would both get paid, no matter the outcome.

For the very first time she felt like she was breaking into a boys' club, as she sat as the only girl at a restaurant table with five men, all of whom were at least fifteen years older than she was. She thought that her well-kept bitchy eyebrows were a help in gaining respect, although the man who sat next to her had apparently never seen her picture because he kept staring at her, like he was surprised, and said she was "a nice change". From what, she wasn't sure, and could only assume Lance.

Halfway through the meal he said, "You're certainly quiet, aren't you?"

"Yeah, well...I am..."

"That's okay. Quiet people always have a lot going on inside..." He squinted and darted his eyes back and forth to demonstrate what he meant. "I salute you for being quiet," he said, putting his fingers to his forehead.

She raised an eyebrow at him. Probably he was just trying to be friendly, but she found it rather patronizing, not to mention completely pointless. The businessman sitting across the table noticed this exchange, and also raised an eyebrow at him.

Daily firing count: three.

Delilah wasn't really sure why people even bothered trying to be friendly to her, because she was never nice enough to be grateful. She remembered being assaulted by Greenpeace volunteers in National Park, or harassed by a romantic French man at the science museum, and wondered how disheartening it could possibly have been for them to encounter her skeptically amused indifference.

When she returned to the pokémon center she wrote a thank you note to a fan who had sent her flowers. She was very tired so she hoped it didn't sound too weird or druggy or anything. It was dark by the time she was done, and it had stopped raining; at a Persian takeaway somebody asked for a picture with her. She thought suddenly of the photographer from earlier in the day and remembered that she hadn't asked for his name. Had that been rude?

Delilah always tried to be polite to people who recognized her in the street, not only because she was encouraged to develop good fan relations, but because she didn't want to end up with a depraved fanatic stealing from her trash and sending her black roses and bad poetry all because she wouldn't take a picture with him.

In bed she rolled over onto her stomach, breathed in deep, and was suddenly hit with a wave of some nostalgic feeling. It didn't really make a difference, but she realized that the reason he hadn't asked her for her name was because he already _knew_ her name. She inhaled again. It was the pillow. It smelled familiar.

How strange celebrity was—in her everyday life there were now far more people who knew her name than there were people whose names she knew. She couldn't remember where she knew the scent from. It smelled like a smell she had smelled before. Celebrities were involved in millions of one-sided relationships; for all that one could appreciate his fans, what percentage of them did he ever really meet?

She sniffed desperately at the pillow, trying to feel something to spark her memory. It reminded her of something. Perhaps this was why fame was so famously fickle: when people didn't know somebody well, they were less likely to accept excuses for transgressions, and more likely to pass a harsher judgment.

It smelled like a European hotel. That was all.


	16. Handsome Devil

_Hi guys, I had this idea and I'm not sure about it...I currently have a LiveJournal account that I've had since middle school that is right now just kind of hanging out not doing much. I was wondering, would you be interested in reading sort of supplemental information about this story now and then, for example if I wrote a little about something that inspired certain parts of the story, just FYI type of stuff. The thing is I can't tell if this is genuinely a good idea, or just sounds cool and would actually be kind of boring for all parties involved. wut do u think Thank you for reading and to those who have reviewed/faved/etc._

**16 Handsome Devil**

Now that Delilah was a trainer of some stature, it was easy to find people who wanted to battle her, but difficult to find people who wanted to battle her for money.

This presented a few logistical problems. She disliked saying no to matches, which she felt were always valuable training, but accepting them even when they involved no financial stakes meant that some days she left the gym with little or no income. This wasn't so big, since she now got paid to do other things like appear at conferences or address the press, but it seemed at this rate that she would end up circulating the gyms even more quickly, simply because the gym leaders were more or less obligated to battle her even if nobody else would.

She didn't see Adam at the gyms like she had in Johto, she assumed because he had probably already won Kanto's badges, considering he lived there and everything. She happened upon him for the first time in November, at the Saffron pokémon center. "I had a dream about you the other night," he said.

"Oh, yeah?"

"You were looking through a catalogue, picking out magazine subscriptions." He shrugged. "Who knows what Freud would say..."

"He'd probably say you have an Oedipus complex."

He laughed. "Well, obviously, I had a rough childhood," he said.

"Then grow up."

He laughed again as the nurse handed him his poké balls. "What are you doing today?"

"Well, nothing, now," she said. "I was just at a master class at the Saffron Gym, so I'll probably just chill out now."

"Do you want to hang out?" he asked. "I have to run some errands for my dad, but we could go to lunch if you want."

First, he took his car to a mechanic to have the oil changed. The man asked, "What sort of oil do you use?"

"Oh," said Delilah, "he usually starts by telling them how beautiful they are..."

"Oh!" Adam exclaimed loudly. "She's funny today! Isn't she funny? Isn't she?"

The mechanic smiled. "Hysterical," he said.

Delilah and Adam stood out of the way for a minute, and Adam started looking for his money. He reached into his pants pocket and frowned. "Huh, I guess I put it in my jacket," he said, unzipping a pocket on his jacket. He took out half of a peppermint Ritter-Sport, a card case, his BlackBerry, and finally a money clip. "Well, forget this, if we've got chocolate," he said, and put everything back except the candy bar, which he snapped in half to share with her.

"I've never had this kind before," she said.

"I'm glad you like it," he said. "I've always been taught that there are three things a girl never deserves. Number one"—he stuck out a finger—"small jewellery. Number two"—he stuck up the next finger—"fake orgasms. And number three"—a third finger went up—"bad chocolate."

She couldn't help but smile. "If there's one thing I like about you, it's that you know what's important in life," she said.

"Well, if there's one thing I like about you...it's..."

"Don't strain yourself."

He laughed. "You're nice to have around when I want to be by myself," he said.

"What is _that_ supposed to mean?"

"It's a compliment," he claimed.

She rolled her eyes. "I'll never be able to repay you," she said.

He stood in front of her, leaning one hand on the wall.

She looked up at him, and felt her face get hot.

"Try," he suggested.

"That's right," she said, becoming conscious of her own blinking. "You're notorious here, aren't you?"

"Don't believe everything you hear," he said. His eyes burned into her like dry ice. "Half the lies they tell about me aren't true."

Her face got hotter. She tried to think of something to say but didn't.

Lazily he looked her over. "Shall I begin by telling you how beautiful you are?" he asked. "Your eyes, maybe?"

She smiled twistedly. "I guess you see your reflection in them?"

His smirking laughter passed over her face. "I wish Irwin were here," he said.

"You really make me feel special," she said. "But not very."

His knee touched hers and she noticed how fast her heart was beating. "Have you talked to him lately?" he asked.

"What, are you in love with him or something? He told me you're the biggest idiot on the face of the planet."

His smile was sudden and radiant. "What did you say?"

"I defended you, of course."

"Really?"

"Sure, I said, 'Irwin, brains aren't everything.'"

He laughed and stood up. "I guess you would know," he said.

"Right, I can tell, you dress to accentuate your mind."

"Oh, like you can talk," he scoffed, gesturing to her chest. "I can see every inch of your brains."

"My brains...?"

"That's what you want men to be interested in, isn't it, your brains. But to show them off like that, it's elitist intellectual snobbery."

"Oh, yeah? Whenever I see you in the rags here they call you a 'smartarse'," she said, mocking his accent. "Everybody seems to be in agreement that that's the most intelligent part of you."

"That's more than I could say for you, because I'd call you a 'dumbass'," he said, exaggerating her accent in turn.

Delilah didn't talk to Irwin as much as she used to; in fact, she didn't talk to anyone as much as she used to, which truthfully wasn't very much in the first place.

Adam dug for his money again but the mechanic said, "It was your birthday recently, wasn't it then?" When Adam said yes, he said, "No need to pay me this time. Just make sure and tell your father, okay?"

What an interesting way of getting people to do you favors, she thought. Probably there was some kind of extortion racket or something going on.

Or maybe it just never hurt to be extra nice to the Harlows.

While the oil was being changed they went into a nearby Superdrug and Adam asked, "Excuse me, do you sell ice bags?"

Rather than dispensing instructions on where to find them, the man said, "Certainly, Mr Harlow," and went off and then came back with an armful of colorful ice bags.

Adam tried them on like a lady picking out a hat. "Have you got any in tartan?" he asked, constantly amazing Delilah with the way he interacted with the world.

After they left he looked at his watch, and then at the window in front of them. "Why don't you try on that dress in the window?" he asked.

"What an obscene and perfectly typical suggestion!" she gasped. "Right there in the window, where everyone could see me? How dare you?"

"Yeah, how do I dare?" he agreed, putting an arm around her, as slick and smooth and curve-conscious as bias-cut charmeuse. "How about a hug, Delilah?"

"Adam, I'll give you exactly thirty minutes to get off me."

He laughed and released her unhurriedly, his high white cheekbones stained pink from cold and arousal.

"Why don't you try on that dress?" she asked, pointing to another.

He pretended to consider it. "I don't think so. I look terrible in earth tones," he said. "They make me look as if I haven't slept in weeks. It's too bad, because they're really lovely."

"I guess," she said. "But you look good in jewel tones, though."

"Well, everybody looks good in something," he said.

Adam occasionally made comments like these, comments that surprised Delilah somewhat, making her reconsider the depth or direction of his vanity. Adam seemed to genuinely believe that anyone could look as good as he did, and if they didn't, it was their own fault because they were just too stupid or lazy to try. Occasionally she got to thinking that the perfect career for him would be as the abrasive host of an obnoxious makeover reality show, like the unholy lovechild of Simon Cowell and Gok Wan. Who would ever guess that Adam was straight...?

...Oh, yeah.

Because of the cut of the bodice she wasn't sure that it would fit her, but Adam told her to try it on anyway because it might give her "a nice décolleté".

She was right: she couldn't close the hook-and-eye, and the zipper only zipped halfway up.

Through the door Adam called, "Is it a fit?"

"More like a convulsion," she said, looking at her reflection and trying to adjust the neckline, which of course didn't work. She wrinkled her nose at the mirror and turned, jumping in fright when she saw Adam hanging over the top of the door.

"You were taking a long time," he explained. "I got you another dress."

"Well, it doesn't fit," she said, taking the second dress from him and showing him her back. "See, it doesn't zip all the way."

"Can I help at all?"

"No, 'cuz it—were you looking while I was changing?"

"No. Is it about to happen again? Maybe I'll get it right this time."

"Oh, go away," she said.

Adam certainly was a funny person. He seemed to be having more fun than she was, and, to his credit, the second dress he chose was even prettier than the first and it fit like a dream, so perhaps there was something to be said for the dubious skill of identifying bra sizes by sight. What a strange situation it must have been, to have been born to Giovanni and Ivy Harlow. Adam's clothes always fit him like a second skin—if they weren't ordered straight off the runways they were probably tailored especially for him on Jermyn Street and Savile Row. Adam probably had _Pretty Woman_ shopping sequences on a regular basis.

She bought the dress at his insistence, even though it was kind of expensive, but she had never worn a dress that fit her so well straight off the rack. Besides, she made a lot more money now, so why not?

"Give me a minute," he said outside, stopping for a Benson & Hedges. "Do you want one?"

She shook her head, and looked at the bank in front of them as he opened his jacket to shield the flame. "2.6%," she said. "Is that good?"

He shrugged. "I guess. But I know how you can get 200% interest."

"Oh? What kind of bank is that?"

"I'll show you, if you'll deposit a kiss with me," he said, leaning toward her expectantly.

She laughed on his face. "I wouldn't kiss you if you were the last man on Earth!" she said, and kissed him. Then she patted his cheek and said, "As luck would have it, you're not."

"Now I return it with 200% interest." He leapt on her like a persian, kissing her hard and fast; his hand was cold on her neck and he tasted like smoke and Acqua di Parma.

"Well," she said dazedly as he wiped lipstick off his mouth. "Banking is much more interesting than I ever gave it credit for."

"You ought to try the post office," he suggested.

"I don't think my reputation is ready for that," she said.

As they waited for their food in a restaurant he told her that he was running errands for his father because he wanted a new motorcycle.

"Well, you never seem to be lacking a car," she said.

"Cars aren't the same."

She smirked. "Yeah, I guess there's a difference between having a passenger seat and a bitch seat..."

He didn't answer her. He seemed to be shivering more than could be rationalized by the temperature.

"Are...dude, are you shaking?"

"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, but that's just...because it's cold, and...I'm not..."

His voice died away. His eyes were wide and not looking at anything in particular. "Are you okay?" she asked.

"I feel dreadful, Delilah. I feel really dreadful." He put his head on his arms on the table. "I feel so terrible right now, Delilah. Oh, God, I feel so bad."

"Um...what's the matter? Are you going to throw up? Are you going to faint, do you have a headache...?"

He wasn't listening. "I have to go to hospital," he said. "I have to go to hospital."

"Uh...are you sure? Really? Are you just freaking out?"

"I'm freaking out, Delilah!" he said. "I can't move my hands!" He lifted his shaking hands and looked them in horror. "Can you get nicotine poisoning?"

"Yeah, but...I mean, I think you can only get it if you, like, swallow tobacco, I don't think just smoking can get toxic levels of nicotine in you."

She felt pretty stupid for not knowing how to drive him home, but Adam drank some water and seemed to feel better by the time their food arrived. He said his head hurt, but he was able to eat.

"Maybe you're having an allergic reaction to something?" she suggested. "Or, what was it that happened to you at the Prep Retreat? Could it have been the same thing? Did you ever find out what happened?"

"Well...I was really hung over that day," he said.

"Didn't you say that the doctors said it was stress?"

"Yeah..."

She wasn't sure if she should pursue it further, but she said, "Wasn't it around that time you and your dad were fighting."

"No, yeah, it was," he said. "It's such a cliché, isn't it?" He laughed hollowly. "That whole...poor-little-rich-kid thing. I mean, do you know what my earliest memory is? The earliest thing I can remember is going up and down the stairs and crying because I couldn't find my parents, 'cos there are so many rooms in our house. I mean, God! I just wish everything about me was not so bloody TYPICAL."

"Yeah, you're the _classic_ example of an only child," she said, pretending to be disgusted.

He laughed, and she felt accomplished. "Of course, the magazines love it," he said. "All that 'allegedly' stuff, and then me coming in as the other woman, it must have been like a gift from God for them."

"Isn't that, like...libel, or invasion of privacy, or something? Defamation?"

"Not if it's true," he said. "And at this point, anyway, I'm probably as good as incapable of further defamation. I know I've ruined your reputation just by being in the same room."

What if there _were_ stealth paparazzi everywhere? Those feminists would really hate her for kissing Adam Harlow, sleazy paragon of threatening male sexuality. But maybe she was just being paranoid. Sometimes she thought about checking the details of her contract to see if it offered her visits to a therapist. Didn't most employers offer that?

In the car he surveyed his splendor in the rear-view mirror. "Ugh," he groaned in disgust. "I look like nothing human."

He looked like a model. But she didn't argue.

"I'm just going to go to my house," he said as he started the car. "I just don't want to drive. But Bailey can take you home probably."

"Okay, that's fine," she said. "Who's Bailey?"

"The driver. I mean, I feel better," he said. "You could stay if you want. I think Gaston is baking today. I don't know, I just...I feel pretty bad..."

"It's no problem," she said. "Who's Gaston?"

"Oh," he said. "He's our chef."

Of course he was.

"Oh, open that ice bag," he said. "I want to see what's in it."

"What's in it?" she repeated, reaching into the backseat for the Superdrug bag. "Why would there be anything in it? They don't come with ice in them, do they?"

"Oh, come on, Delilah, I bought it for my _dad_," he said. "He wouldn't ask me to buy an ice bag if he had a headache, that's servant stuff. He's only having me do things I don't want to do."

She opened it and didn't know what he meant until she reached her fingers in and found three feet of diamonds. "Oh my God," she gasped.

"Ice," he said simply.

When they got into his house Giovanni could be heard in the next room asking, "Whither our son, my dear?" There was the smacking sound of a kiss. "Have you seen him?"

"Neither hide nor hair," said Ivy.

"So it's been a good day, then."

"Oh! You're a terrible person..."

Adam was visibly unimpressed with this conversation.

The sound of Brian Atwood heels heralded Ivy's arrival. "Oh! You're home!" she said, pulling on a pair of gloves. "Your father's looking for you. Hello, Delilah, how are you?"

"I figured," said Adam. "I got a gift..."

"Of course you did, darling," Ivy cooed dismissively, patting his handsome cheek as she picked up her purse. "Good looks, glamour, talent. And then you got your nose from your father."

"Ho ho!" said Giovanni, appearing in the doorway. "Sometimes, Adam, I'm very glad you didn't inherit your talented, glamourous, good-looking mother's rather lamentable sense of humour."

"Why don't you go and lie down, dear," said Ivy. "You're cross and disagreeable when you're tired."

"Isn't that amazing, Delilah," Adam commented, "how married people notice those things about each other? Why, I never can tell when he's tired!"

"Of all the rotten luck," said Giovanni. "It was a dormant trait, not a dead one. I should have realised when you came home that my luck wasn't that good."

Adam seemed to ignore him, turning to his mother with a pitiful, injured look. "Mumsy," he mewled horribly, holding his abdomen, "can you take me to a doctor?"

She dropped her purse immediately. "What's the matter, sweetie?" she asked, touching his face.

"Daddy is so funny that I think I ruptured my pancreas."

"Oh...!" she said, throwing her hands in the air. "There are too many bad comedians in the world and it seems most of them live in this house..."

She rushed off to some kind of charity event or something, something a typical rich wife did.

Giovanni leaned on the doorframe, taking in Adam's appearance.

"Well, now," he said. "Aren't you looking particularly strapping today?"

"As a matter of fact, I am," said Adam, starting to pull Delilah into another room, "but why would _you_ mention it?"

"Just a minute, Beau Brummel," said Giovanni, brandishing a piece of paper. "What's this bill?"

"I had three blank clothes hangers in my closet," sniffed Adam. "You're the one always on about not wasting."

"Oh, that's all it is with you, isn't it! Spending!"

"Oh, calm down, Daddy, that's what money is _for_, and you've got plenty of it."

"But not because I spend it!" he sputtered. "That's not what intelligent people do with money! They _use_ it to make _more_ money!"

"To what other end?" asked Adam, and put out his hand expectantly. "Can I have twenty quid, or are you papering your office with it?"

"I don't think so, darling," he said coolly. "You clearly don't know its value."

"You're right," said Adam. "Make it fifty."

"Why don't you try doing some chores, Adam?" Giovanni suggested.

"What on earth would I do with chores?"

"The swimming pool is being drained; why don't you help clean it?"

Adam's lip curled daintily, his delicate sensibilities offended. "But it's dirty," he said, and then looked at Delilah, who increasingly felt as if her presence were intrusive. "I have a _guest_, Daddy," he whined.

"A guest!" Giovanni repeated. "What a switch from the usual hostages."

"You'll have to excuse me, Delilah," Adam sighed, putting the back of his hand to his forehead. "Strangely, this exorbitant sarcasm seems to be doing rather little for my ailing health."

"Oh, stop it," said Giovanni. "You're too healthy for your own good. You could use a little sickness."

Adam glared at him disdainfully and turned flouncily to the staircase, hitting his foot on the bottom step. "Ouch!" he gasped in pain. "These stupid stairs—!"

Giovanni looked skeptical. "How do you tell the stupid ones from the smart ones?"

"Who put this staircase there, anyway?"

"It's been there since you were a child, and since I was a child, too."

"Well, why didn't somebody _warn_ me?"

Delilah sort of wanted to see Adam's room. She couldn't help but imagine that, where other boys might have pictures of attractive women, Adam might have actual half-naked girls waiting for him, a stable full of also-rans vying for his attention. In fact it did not seem nearly as absurd as it should have to picture his walls decorated with the mounted heads (or other body parts) of his most beautiful or famous entanglements, perhaps one girl lying on the floor like a trophy bearskin rug.

Delilah stepped back for a minute, realizing what a weird, disturbing image her mind had come up with. Yikes! Good thing nobody else ever had to know about it, and her thoughts weren't being relayed to an anonymous audience somewhere...as far as she knew. On second thought, maybe those therapist visits wouldn't be such a good idea. They'd probably think she was crazy.


	17. Danger! High Voltage

**17 Danger! High Voltage**

It was Friday night in Celadon and Delilah sat in the launderette, watching her clothes spin around as the rain came down loud and hard outside. Her Pokégear rang as a bolt of lightning lit up the clouds in the distance, bleaching a hot white strip across the dark sky; from the laundry basket, Beau looked out the window, his pupils contracting into slits and then dilating again as the light normalized.

"Hello?"

Without any pretense Adam whined horribly, "What's wrong with me, Delilah?"

"What's _wrong_ with you...!"

"I don't blame you for laughing," he sighed. "It must be difficult to understand that I'm not perfect."

"I think I could be convinced," she said.

"After all, I'm rich, talented, undeniably handsome..."

"All you need is a little confidence!" she said. "You can try one of those self-help books. After three months of telling yourself that you're successful and lovable, apparently you'll fall for it."

"It's quite a pickle I'm in," he divulged conspiratorially. "I'd like to ask you to be my date at a dinner party, but I've just not got the courage!"

"How sad," she said. "I guess I'll go through life never knowing."

"And I suppose you wouldn't consider selling yourself?" he asked.

"Only to the highest bidder," she said loftily.

"Well, I have a rich father!"

"But he's married," she said.

"I use his credit cards," he said.

"Well then when is the party?"

"Tomorrow," he said.

"Thanks for the advanced notification..."

"You see why I needed a confidence boost," he said. "It's awfully rude and presumptuous to ask at such late notice."

"It certainly is," she agreed. "I should probably hang up on you."

"Why haven't you, then?" he asked. "Maybe you like me, a little bit?"

"Maybe," she said, and paused. "Or maybe my only other recreational plans were to go to the Poké Mart for flea medication..."

In a room full of men in dark suits and women in Ferragamo pumps, Adam wore skintight leather and a tartan dinner jacket.

"Well, have fun," said Giovanni. "And be good."

"Oh, make up your mind," Adam muttered.

Giovanni raised an eyebrow. "You had just better do your damnedest to keep your handsome young proboscis out of trouble," he said. "Remember what I told you..."

In a relationship, power was held by one who could provide something desired by the other. Adam told her he was supposed to talk to a man at the party about a position in Team Rocket (but nobody actually said "Team Rocket"—just "them"), something like a job interview, and then maybe he'd get his motorcycle. "He's a fence," he said.

"Why are you qualified to judge whether he deserves this? I mean...you're not part of—them," she said, catching herself.

"Yes, that's true," he admitted. "But there's something in this for _me_."

She couldn't argue with that "logic", but she had to think that this job couldn't be particularly important to be put into hands like Adam's; she wasn't hip to all the ins and outs of Team Rocket politics, but she figured that most positions were flexibly expendable, and this was probably mostly a test to see how much maturity Adam could show in a vaguely professional situation.

Giovanni would have doubtless loved for Adam to grow into an appreciation for the business that kept the Turnbull & Asser shirt on his back; lucky(?) him, Adam was quite open to bribes.

The man shook Adam's hand and said, "Hey, how are you?" He was American, maybe in his thirties. "You can call me George. Can I call you Adam?"

"Yes, of course," said Adam, and motioned to Delilah. "This is Delilah Peerenboom..."

He smiled broadly and extended his hand to her with an unnerving stare. "Nice to meet you!"

"Nice to meet you too," she said, and shook his hand.

"She recently became Pokémon League World Champion," Adam told him.

"Wow!" said George, and gestured to her. "Well, she is just a knockout, I'll tell you what!"

"Thank you," said Delilah, although she felt a little bit uncomfortable to have him speak of her in the third person while looking directly at her.

"Just let me have her, I'll work for free!"

There was a substantial silence.

George burst into overcompensatory laughter. Delilah giggled nervously. Adam didn't appear to be ready to indulge in the illusion that he found it at all funny.

What did everybody else think this party was for? Lance had once told her to be careful with Adam and his parents, especially if there were press nearby, and she finally understood why: most people assumed shadiness about Giovanni, even if they weren't totally sure of specifics and even if there was no proof in the public eye that Team Rocket was still functioning, and it was her responsibility as Champion to show the Pokémon League in a good light.

"So," Adam began.

"Um..." George clapped his hands together. "What do you think of the application?"

"My dad loves the application," said Adam.

"Does he really?"

"The application is great," he continued. "You have all the right background, it's all really good."

"Great," said George. "Thanks a lot. I'm really glad..."

That was the point of her contract. It detailed money and privacy but more than that she had promised to keep the League's public persona well-manicured. Being famous was about image: creating it, altering it, maintaining it. Did she interrupt the League's good face by being seen with Adam, whose father's fame was built on allegations of animal exploitation? To think she had worried about the feminists...

"So, uh...what do you think? You're, uh...?"

"Well, I think you're very much of interest to them," said Adam. "You've got all the skills and the experience that they like. Clearly my dad likes you on paper—you're doing something right to get an invitation here, right?"

He addressed this last bit to Delilah, possibly to make the conversation look less suspicious or less inviting. "Oh—sure," she said, not sure what she should say. "I mean...jeez, I don't know anything about it, you're in charge here..." She made an awkward face and shrugged, and they laughed.

"That's a point in our favour, at least," said Adam.

"Well, since you're in charge, why don't you let me have your girlfriend for the night, and you and I can maybe work something out? What do you think?"

There was another very long silence.

George again burst into laughter that was more intense than necessary. Delilah again giggled in insulted discomfort. Adam again seemed to be debating between a selfish desire for a motorcycle and a selfish desire to punch him in the face.

Lance and Red had both publicly decried Team Rocket and she felt guilty all of a sudden and very selfish for the times when she had been presented with the opportunity to do so and had not been interested. Of course, Adam had spoken very badly of Team Rocket, too, perhaps even worse than anybody else, but coupled with his explosive and sometimes quite public issues with his parents this tended to solidify rather than dissipate people's suspicions about his father.

Still, Delilah did not dislike Giovanni. He was obviously a very smart man and it was hard not to feel sympathy for someone who had known Adam for such a long time. He was always very nice to her; it didn't come off terribly phony, but she figured it was sort of calculated. She sort of assumed that he felt her apathy was harmless and therefore didn't try to court her. She certainly didn't approve of Team Rocket, but could the media be expected to know that?

"So let's cut to the chase," said Adam. "Uh...how much are you thinking?"

"Well," said George. "I'm asking 4,000."

Adam raised his eyebrows.

"I'm _asking_," George emphasized, and laughed.

"Okay," said Adam. "Well, that's...high. You're at two and a half, three years, something like that?"

"I'm at, uh, three years, yeah."

"Yeah. It's, it's..." Adam shook his head. "I mean, with things looking the way they do? This is a global trade, and nobody is recession-proof. They're not interested in £4,000 a month for this."

Was it wrong to be apathetic about Team Rocket? She didn't really know what they did exactly, which was why she reserved judgment. She realized with a start how much power she held. She knew something that most of the world didn't. She didn't even think Lance knew about it. Delilah could tell anybody she wanted whenever she felt like it. She could tell Lance, she could tell the police, she could tell an entire press conference. Giovanni would obviously go to prison if she did that, and probably his mother, in all likelihood stripping the Harlows of their wealth. Maybe even Ivy and Adam would go to jail! Was it illegal not to tell?

"Give me a counteroffer," said George. "I mean, my...my _asking_ price is 4,000."

Adam blinked and said, "I think they'd be interested in something less than 2500."

George bit his lip. There was a short pause. "Um...I gotta be honest with you," he said. "It's just, uh, it's...it's...it's very _low_, I mean, I'd rather not even work with them, to be honest with you."

"All right, how about this," said Adam. "What if we do this: they're at two and a half, you're at four. What if we split it down the middle, make it 3250, and they pay 16,000 up front, include an office, and we have a deal."

"I..." George stopped to think. Delilah was quite stunned by Adam's business savvy, even though she had no idea what they were talking about, it certainly sounded impressive.

Delilah thought Giovanni must have known how much she knew about Team Rocket (although, she realized, it wasn't a whole lot). She had spent enough time with Adam to have a bit of an (admittedly very partisan) education. Giovanni had never mentioned it, even during the few times that they had been more or less alone (such as in the car on the way to the hotel restaurant, or eating Gaston's tarte tatin in their kitchen before Bailey took her back to the Vermilion pokémon center), but she wondered if he maybe had people watching her day and night to ensure that she didn't mess anything up. What if somebody could come around at any moment and shoot her if she mentioned Team Rocket? In a case such as that one her feminine wiles could get her only so far. Delilah did not like violence, especially after watching the three-hour-long Robert De Niro war movie _The Stantler Hunter_ with her dad, and blood was a hard stain to remove. Being in a potentially powerful position did not, in fact, make her feel strong.

"I don't mind the lump payment," said George. "I think that's fine, it's not an issue for me. Um...an office, in London?"

"London head office block. Is that good?"

"Um, wow," said George. "Uh...depends."

Adam laughed desperately. "_Depends_?"

"It depends on...your girlfriend."

There was yet another rather sturdy silence.

Once again, George burst into a laughter whose aggressiveness could not really be justified by the level of humor. Once again, Delilah giggled uneasily and felt degraded and insecure. But this time, Adam didn't keep his mouth shut.

"Would you be more comfortable if Delilah left?" he asked snappishly. "An organisation as big as this one has no room for some offensive bit of lochia who'll lose it when he's got to talk to a woman. A weakness is a weakness and, whatever you think, in this market they can afford to be discriminating. I'm not emotionally invested in your hiring; do they need you more than you need them?"

George looked surprised. "God, no, we've got ourselves a deal."

"Okay, good," said Adam.

"Absolutely," George agreed, and they shook hands. "Thank you, Adam. You're the man. Thanks a lot." He put out his hand to Delilah. "Pleasure," he said. "Delilah?"

"Delilah, yeah."

"Nice to meet you," he said again. "She _is_ gorgeous."

"I'll tell her you said so. Come on, Delilah," Adam snipped, grabbing her wrist and pulling her away.

"Thanks very much," said George.

Adam called him an omasum. Delilah didn't know what an omasum was but it sounded quite vulgar and offensive.

"Are you okay?" she asked once they got to the other side of the room, Adam apparently choosing to separate himself from George with groups of people and the band.

"I didn't know a smarm could be so utter!" he fumed comically, letting go of her forcefully. "Can you believe what he said!"

"What, that I'm pretty?" She smirked. "You disagree?"

"He told _me_ you're pretty," he said. "He said nothing to _you_."

He seemed genuinely angry, but she found it quite funny now that it was over. "This is oddly crusading of you," she said. "But it's really not a big deal. I don't mind."

"Do you want a cigarette?"

He always asked her this even though she always said no. Maybe she would try it one day—she hated to admit it but it did tempt her curiosity—but today she said, "No. Are you even allowed?" There were other people smoking, but Delilah had been under the impression that it was against the law to smoke in an enclosed space (although, perhaps this was a finicky quibble in a room full of gangsters).

"I don't care," he said.

"Hey, so did you ever figure out what happened and made you sick? I mean, it can't have been nicotine poisoning, I don't think."

He shrugged. "I was just tired," he said rather cryptically.

He seemed aggravated so she decided not to pick at him.

"I'll try a watermelon martini," he told the bartender. "Double."

The bartender hesitated. "Er, I don't know that there's room in the glass..."

"Then get rid of the watermelon! Take out _something_!" snapped Adam, waving his cigarette irritably.

The bartender got a little sassy and offered to make him a drink called a Redheaded Slut, and said he could even put it on Coke if he wanted.

Apparently this was only a half-joke. A group of tiresome people recognized her and Adam and began to swarm them with questions. Adam wouldn't say a word to them; he made an unsuccessful phone call, responding only with looks of bored superiority to their queries of if he and Delilah were dating or if they wanted to go and "call Katie", which Delilah belatedly realized meant Kate Moss, which she belatedly realized meant cocaine.

A man with gin breath and a wedding ring was hitting on her horribly when another guy came up, laughed, and said, "Aw, are my friends bothering you?"

Adam smiled exquisitely and said, "Yes."

There seemed to be something more threatening about Adam's smile than his frown because they disappeared soon after.

Adam leaned back on the bar on his elbows. "I hope you're not finding this as boring as I am," he said. "I've really got to stay a bit longer. You could leave, if you wanted."

"Nah, it's funny," she said. "It's an interesting collection of people. Though some of them I guess I'd rather just watch."

He smirked. He was close enough that the little scoffing exhalation made her blink. He started to say something, but didn't, and she knew for a moment that he was going to kiss her. The panic must have shown on her face, because he didn't.

Adam's grandmother was from northern Italy, and Adam told her that as a result Team Rocket was a lot more business than family. However there was one man who kissed and gushed over Adam and said, "Hai compiuto gli anni, sì? Quanti anni hai?"

"Sì, yes, I did, novembre," said Adam. "I'm twenty-two."

"I knew it. See? Lo direi," he said, holding Adam's face. "You're taller now, sei così bello. Isn't he handsome and tall?"

Delilah nodded.

"Look at you," he said, shifting his hold from Adam's face to Delilah's. "Are you with him? You're as beautiful as melons." He kissed her cheeks. "Smell this and remember me," he said, removing his buttonhole and handing it to her. He looked at Adam seriously. "Watch her," he said, pointing to Delilah. "You watch her like a pidgeot."

"I can't tell if he's drunk," said Delilah after he had walked away.

"He asked me if I had a birthday," said Adam. "Of course I've had a birthday: I was twelve the last time he saw me. I should hope I'm taller and handsomer..."

When they found Adam's parents, talking to another couple, Adam tried to bring up his new motorcycle but Giovanni asked with placid disapproval, "Why didn't you tell me sooner? Did I not tell you to let me know immediately?"

"What did you expect me to do?" asked Adam. "You didn't answer your phone, like I knew you wouldn't, and how was I meant to know where you were?"

"You could have left me a message," said Giovanni, smooth and deliberate and slightly warning. "You could have texted me."

Adam returned his expression of steady intensity; the resemblance was suddenly striking. "I lost my voice."

Giovanni rolled his yes. "Ahi! Poveretto..."

"Come on, now, no fighting," said Ivy. "What do you think they all think of you?"

"I never thought about it," said Adam, as if this were a new concept. "What _do_ they all think of me?"

"Well," said Giovanni, "half of them think you're an egomaniac."

"And the other half?"

"The other half can't stand you."

"That's enough," said Ivy.

There was a very short, very awkward silence, and then the other couple (whose names Delilah forgot immediately) asked her questions about being Champion. "What sort of things do you do, as Champion?" asked the wife. "What are your duties?"

"Well, I don't _have_ to do anything," she said. "But they _like_ it when I do kind of promotional stuff for the League. Lately I do a lot of like education-type stuff, just showing people how I battle and everything..."

"How interesting," she said, and looked at Adam. "And you train pokémon, too, don't you?"

Adam seemed deep in thought, and was sneering apparently unconsciously.

"Adam," Giovanni snapped.

"What," said Adam reflexively, jerking his gaze up. He looked around at his father. "Did you want me, Daddy?"

"Want?" Giovanni repeated, his eyebrows raised. "Let's not overdo it, my old pride and joy."

Adam's surly expression intensified. There was not an emotion in the world that Adam bothered to keep off his face and the sheer number of things he could express with the quirk of a perfect nostril was truly a testament to his convoluted personality.

"Oh, stop it," said Ivy shortly. "This isn't the time. Don't embarrass me."

"Well, no, Mummy, I think he raises a perfectly reasonable point," said Adam.

The other couple looked interested; Adam's parents looked like they dreaded whatever he was going to say.

"He just wants to know why I act the way I do," Adam continued, "and I don't blame him. I do have a reason, but it's not anything I've ever told anybody."

Giovanni didn't seem eager to hear it, but Adam kept going.

"I behave strangely, and I'll admit that," he said. "I call people names until they cry and when I wake up mornings I say, 'Today I think I'll hit somebody so then I'll feel better about myself.' And you want to know why?"

Ivy looked beautiful and ashamed and very tired.

"I'll tell you why I do this," said Adam.

"Well then tell us, then," said Giovanni impatiently.

Adam looked at him levelly, his top lip twisting insolently. "It's because," he said, measuring each syllable with relish, "I'm an ego_maniac_."

The other couple laughed uncertainly, clearly hoping he was joking but frightened by his intensity.

"And I _wish_," said Adam, "that the world revolved around me."

Giovanni looked uninterested. "If wishes were staraptors, beggars would eat birds. Dreams," he said, "are but the ambitions of the incompetent."

"I had a dream where Pamela Anderson did stand-up comedy in my backyard," said Delilah immediately.

There was a half second's silence, and then Ivy and the other couple laughed.

"It's just one bike," Adam implored him. "Come on, Daddy—I appeal to you."

"Not particularly," Giovanni uttered, not looking at him.

Suddenly Adam stood up. "Dance with me, Delilah," he commanded, putting out his hand to her.

She obeyed without hesitation, putting her hand in his and standing, and they moved closer to the cheesy jazz band. Adam put a hand on her hip, she tentatively touched his tartan shoulder, and they began swaying vaguely.

"So fucking annoying," he sighed cantankerously.

She had to crane her neck if she wanted to look at him. "Maybe he's trying to toughen you up," she said.

"Well it's not bloody well working," he insisted.

She sighed at his lapels.

Adam was quiet for a moment, and then said, "It's done nothing but make me angry and mean."

"Well, I wouldn't have you any other way, dear," she said jokingly.

He laughed humorlessly, but didn't say anything.

She was a little bit uncomfortable. Where was she supposed to focus her gaze? It made sense that she was supposed to look at his face, but that seemed pretty awkward, since the height difference meant going out of her way to do so. And as lovely as his lapels certainly were, staring at them was also quite awkward. Looking at their feet would be awkward. Looking around at everybody else would be awkward too. Was she supposed to close her eyes, then? She tried to think up something to say but the effort was predictably fruitless.

"Come on, touch me, a little bit," he said suddenly, brusque and almost pleading, as he closed the distance between them and manually placed her arm around his neck.

She felt herself blush at her small failure, but she still wasn't sure what to do. If he wanted her to talk, he would ask her something; did he want her to be quiet, or was he ambivalent? Maybe he just wanted her not to talk? Maybe he just wanted to feel up her boobs? Should she lean into him? Was her arm falling asleep?

It felt really sort of anonymous and impersonal; in fact he seemed preoccupied, as if Delilah weren't really there. And while it did feel sort of sexy to be pressed up against him, what she really felt for him in that moment was an odd sort of pity, an unfamiliar pathos she had never associated with him before.

In her awkward position, she saw his laryngeal prominence move up and down as he swallowed. "I've always wondered," she said: "what do you call your Adam's apple?"

"What?"

"Well, it can't be correct to say 'Adam's Adam's apple'. Do you just call it your 'apple'?"

"How often do you think I need to mention it?"

"That's never occurred to you?"

"Never."

Adam went to the bathroom so she started wandering around eating canapés and looking at people. She saw George across the room, and he smiled at her. She kind of raised her eyebrows in a face of politely skeptical acknowledgement (although she wasn't sure how well he could even see her face, considering the lighting where she was standing), and then she turned and continued away before he could approach her.

She met Adam again and they stepped outside to get some air, but mostly so Adam could complain about his parents. "You don't know how lucky you are, with your family," he said. "Even though you have siblings, you're all probably the most important thing in your parents' lives."

"I guess," she said.

"With my parents," he said glumly, "it's just incidental. It's just a footnote. Like, oh, by the way, parenthood."

"Well, I don't know," she said. "I think your parents love you. I'm sure they think you're important."

"You only think that because that's the kind of family you have," he said.

Maybe that was true, but maybe it wasn't.

"I read your interview in _Pokémon Handbook_," he said.

"Yeah, I've been pretty busy lately..."

Suddenly his tune changed and he frowned. "Busy? With what?" he spat bitterly. "Just busy being good at anything you do?"

"Well, sure," she said, but he didn't laugh.

He snorted derisively. "God. You can do whatever you want. I don't get it! Okay? I don't get it. It's like you became the Champion just because you wanted it badly enough."

"Are you kidding?"

"No."

"How can you be so sure? I never thought about pokémon training as something that actually applied to me. This has nothing to do with what I want!"

"Your life is perfect, Delilah!" he said, louder and angrier. "Nothing bad ever happens to you!"

"You don't even know what you're talking about!"

"You're the young and beautiful Pokémon League World Champion!" he said. "Your pokémon are perfect! Your family is perfect! Your interviews are perfect! If this isn't what you want, then what _do_ you want?"

"You're _jealous_!" she gasped. "You know what's wrong with you! You're spiteful! You're vengeful, vindictive, and possessive! You're demanding, and unforgiving!"

He was clearly struggling against an overwhelming desire to smack her soundly across the face. The fact that he was mad made her mad, and she stamped her foot in a fit, throwing her purse on the ground.

"Just because you finally realize you're not as good as you thought you were!" she almost screeched. "Because _nobody_ is _that_ good! And you can't stand it, because your ego is all that's holding you together!"

"SHUT UP!" he shouted, his full intimidating height towering over her.

She shut up.

He was scowling. She thought he might hit her. He was so angry it made the air feel different. He pulled on her hair and slammed his mouth against hers. She kissed him back without further reflection as his hands searched her figure with unambiguous interest; she felt blind with lust and anger and fear, grabbing at any part of him she could reach.

Adam was clearly not a man starved of sex, but he kissed her with an intense and almost vicious desperation whose ferocity overwhelmed and might have frightened her if she hadn't been so mindlessly focused on the fierce heat coming off his body, his hands under her clothes while his teeth scraped her neck. She wasn't even sure if her feet were still on the ground, or if she was being underpinned entirely by the force of Adam's body pressing her to the wall, but she didn't care because it was just too exciting to feel the barbell through his tongue, the ring in his lip, his hips and hands and chest and breath. She could feel her heartbeat in her lip between his teeth and they couldn't touch each other enough but they tried.

He stopped and she turned to see George standing there looking surprised and embarrassed.

"Oh, I'm sorry!" he said, and hurried back around the corner of the building and she felt a little bit guilty.

Adam cursed and demounted, robbing her of her balance. She almost fell down for the support loss and reached out for something to steady herself, grabbing his sleeve as she slipped into a squatting position.

He looked down on her and scowled.

"Go away," he growled softly.

She felt her face twist as she fought off sudden tears.

He yanked his arm away and went back to the party.


	18. There's Too Much Love

**18 There's Too Much Love**

With his thoroughbred good looks and shocking reputation, Adam was every gossip's natural favorite, so there was no shortage of pictures of him sneering and strutting around with an air of menace.

_Nobody's boyfriend Adam Harlow, 22, makes a typically impressive entrance wearing a look that could melt chrome and a good-looking woman on his arm: Pokémon League golden girl Delilah Peerenboom, 19. According to eyewitness reports, Beauty and the Beast canoodled and close-danced but left separately; supposedly Adam, ever the gossip columnist's darling, threw a tempestuous tantrum in the men's room and smashed a bottle of Guerlain _Habit Rouge_ against a mirror so the attendants had a chance to earn their wage—considerate really!_

Overlapping the picture of her and Adam was a picture taken of her the next day in Covent Garden. The wind blew her hair around and there was a blue circle around a hickey revealed on the side of her neck with all caps proclaiming it "THE SMOKING GUN!"

Her hand went immediately to her neck. The bruise was no longer visible by that point, but it felt like he had bitten his initials into her skin.

She sat in the Fuchsia Gym gift shop/café and a girl named Alice, who had had a badge match that day, asked, "What did you think of my battling?"

One of the problems with people knowing that Delilah was Pokémon League World Champion was that they would frequently ask right away what she thought of their battling. This was a bit of a social puzzle. Not really a jigsaw, or a sudoku, but perhaps a crossword, the British kind where there was less confidence in the answers. If it were wrong, the whole thing might have to be erased, so Delilah never put an answer down unless she was very sure of it (yet the surer she was, somehow the likelier she was to be wrong).

But the real life crossword was always in pen. She didn't want to lie but she didn't want to be bluntly honest because people always seemed to interpret this as her acting superior. She found that people often became defensive of their decisions when she talked to them, even when she didn't disagree with them, and this was something she didn't really understand. Did she really come off that judgmental? How could she think a decision was wrong, if it had really happened? The truth was just what it was.

Alice was a genuinely good trainer, the kind who could logically expect to win badges on the first try, but her battling rarely deviated from standard practice and Delilah thought she would struggle at a more competitive level, and that the sudden difficulty would take her by surprise.

"Your pokémon are so responsive to you commands!" said Delilah.

Alice smiled, satisfied with this deceptively casual evaluation. Delilah, hesitant to lie ("That was wonderful!") and equally hesitant to be truthful ("I really don't understand why, when it was quite obvious the opponent could only withstand one more hit, you decided to use a status move—what could you possibly have been thinking?"), usually resolved to say something objective like this but sort of obscure so it sounded insightful. (It worked every time.)

She felt suddenly nostalgic for those days of badge collecting...well, she was still collecting badges—she had three from Kanto now, but it was different somehow. Her number of badges no longer defined her as a trainer. It seemed to serve a less immediate purpose now. She didn't have to win badges to qualify as a League Tournament participant anymore. It seemed funny that she had been so unexcited about badges and tournaments...if not for others' prompting, she might never have entered.

There had then been a sense of exploration about pokémon training, a freedom that it didn't really matter. Now people cared about her, people she didn't even know and would never know. People had expectations or desires about her performance in matches, and even out of matches—since being seen with Adam Harlow, her scandal magazine stock had risen by several percents.

For some reason lots of tabloids often had little featurettes with titles like "CELEBS—JUST LIKE US" with pictures of famous people grocery shopping and holding their children's hands. In one such spread was a photo of Delilah with a scraped knee from when she tripped over her cousin at Christmastime on the way to the movies, the caption saying that "they" get bumps and bruises the same way normal people do.

It came as a bit of a shock to realize that she was no longer included in "us". She was a "they" now. It was interesting to see how she was portrayed in tabloids, which published more stories than articles, meaning that most of the writers treated her as a character, choosing which parts of her personality were appropriate to mention in order to attract readers. Descriptions of her in interview articles were usually more admiring and respectful (though one puzzled her by saying she had "an aura of hide-and-seek"—what was that supposed to mean?), and tabloid articles usually used more alliteration and sometimes rhyme.

But was it true? Were "they" really just like "us"? If Delilah were just like everybody else, she wouldn't be famous. Nobody would care if she weren't different. Delilah had always sort of taken for granted the rate at which she won badges; during the year following her high school graduation, her first real exposure to the world of pokémon training, she had won badges on almost a monthly basis without really being aware of how abnormal it was. She had won eight badges just in time to qualify for the Silver Conference. She had to think it must be quite boring to do it any slower.

She bought a pair of turquoise Manolo Blahnik sandals at an invitation-only 90%-off sale at the Celadon Department Store and wore them to a League dinner. Their beauty was helpful in distracting people from asking her about the 1994 Polish National Champion's BubbleBeam technique, or the body image problems of the modern teenage girl. However as she was about to leave with Lance, who had driven her there, somebody said, "Um, Delilah?"

She turned. A girl stood there smiling.

"Hi, I was wondering if you could give me some advice?"

"What kind of advice?"

"About training pokémon."

"Well, of course I could," she said. Her feet were blocked from the girl's view by Lance. "But just so you know, I'm going to be lecturing at a training seminar in Pewter in a few weeks. Brock Harrison will be there, and Jeanette Fisher, and I think Pete Pebbleman."

"Oh—thank you," she said. "But it's just a quick question..."

"Yeah, of course, go ahead." Lance left to quickly go to the bathroom, but the girl didn't look down.

"Um well...well, I've watched all your battles I can find on the internet," she said, blushing, "and I notice that your pokémon always attack when you tell them to, every time, they always obey the command. How do you do that?"

Delilah was a little confused. "What do you mean?" she asked, shifting slightly to a sort of Botticelli pose so that her right shoe was more prominent, but she still didn't notice.

"I mean—my pokémon stops listening to me when we battle," she said. "When we're training, she attacks every time I tell her to. But as soon as we start a match, she'll do it a couple of times, but then she stops. Do you think she gets nervous, or...?"

"Nervous? Huh," said Delilah, her chin in her hand. "I don't know if I've ever heard of something like that. How do you reinforce her?"

"Sorry?"

"What's your reward schedule like? How often do you reward her for performing in training? Do you use a clicker, or...?"

"That's where I don't understand it!" she said. "I reward her every time!"

"Oh," said Delilah, realizing the mundane inexpertise of the problem. "Well you don't want to reinforce it every time she performs. Because when you stop, your pokémon'll stop too."

"Why?"

Delilah stopped for a minute, not having anticipated that she would have to explain it. "Well, because, let's say you're training your pokémon to use, like, Tackle, for example. Every time she does it, you give her a treat. So that's what she learns: she uses Tackle, and she gets a treat. She uses Tackle again, gets another treat. Once more, one more treat. Every time she does it, she gets a treat. Okay?"

"Okay."

"So then let's say you're in a match, and you call Tackle. Your pokémon does it—but she doesn't get a treat. 'Cuz you're in a match. Well, she wasn't expecting that—every other time she's done Tackle, she's gotten a treat, right? So she's going to decide to stop doing it, if she's not going to get a treat anymore."

"But you can't give a pokémon a treat in a match," she said. "So how do you get it to do it anyway, even if it's not going to get a treat?"

"Well, you give it a treat _sometimes_—just not _every_ time," said Delilah. She assumed that this girl must be the daughter of some kind of League insider, in order to be at the party, so she wasn't sure why she had to explain all this. "Because if you do that, if you reward it unpredictably, it won't know when it's going to get a treat. So every time you call Tackle, there's a _chance_ that it'll get a treat..."

As she and Lance walked to his car he asked her, "What was her question?"

"Oh, nothing exciting," said Delilah. "She was reinforcing her pokémon every time it performed..." Lance turned a corner into an alley, and she followed him. "Didn't you park the other way?" she asked. "Is this a shortcut or—?"

He suddenly grabbed her, getting a sharp intake of her breath as he pulled her to him. "Don't turn around," he whispered gruffly, holding her head firmly against his chest with his hand so she wouldn't be tempted to look behind them. "Just follow me for a minute, okay?"

"Okay," she squeaked.

He lowered his arm to a tight grip around her shoulders and began walking more quickly. Her hair was messy from where his hand had loosened a bobby pin. They turned a corner and he stopped, so she did too.

He released her and stood there for several moments, listening. At first there was just silence; then, the steady tattoo of footsteps, coming closer.

The next sequence of events happened quite quickly. Lance grabbed at a figure coming around the corner, Delilah gasped decoratively, and there was a struggle for a few minutes that in the dim light just looked like a shadowy mass. The man managed to strike him; Lance cried out, his hand flying to his face, and the man took the opportunity to run away. There was a clattering sound and a burst of light as Lance's altaria emerged from its poké ball, which had fallen to the ground.

The altaria looked at him and made a croaking call before preening its feathers a little. In the brief flash afforded by the opening poké ball, Delilah saw that the clattering had been caused by another object—a camera, falling out of its case. She stooped to pick it up, along with Lance's poké ball. "Are you okay?" she asked him.

"He poked me in the eye," he said, holding a hand over part of his face.

She handed him his poké ball, and he recalled the altaria after giving it a little pat. "This is what he dropped," Delilah reported, giving him the camera.

"So he was a journalist," said Lance. "I thought he might have been a Rocket."

"I think 'journalist' is a strong word," she said.

He laughed, clicking through pictures, the light from the camera screen illuminating his face dramatically.

"Anything interesting?" she asked.

"Not really," he said. "Mostly us."

"I'm very interesting, actually."

At an interview she was asked, "So, Lance Siegfried...are you dating?"

"I think my publicist would like me to say yes," she said, and he laughed. "But no, we're not...he's a little bit older..."

"He's a young man," he insisted. "How old is he, twenty-seven? Or is he twenty-eight now. And you're nineteen? That's not so bad."

"Yeah, but...that's closer to ten years than it is to five..."

"That's true."

"I mean, he's great, I like him a lot, and respect him a lot. But..." She trailed off, shrugging.

"So how about Adam Harlow?"

She laughed. "You are asking way too many pertinent questions," she said, and he laughed again.

Delilah had said more than once that she was not looking for a boyfriend; she disliked repeating herself, because it made her feel like she was getting defensive, but nobody seemed to believe her because they still kept asking the same question as if she hadn't even responded. She had to wonder if they would still have ignored this answer if she were a boy. She also had to wonder if they would have ignored her answer if she didn't wear eyeliner. It had been five months since she had become Champion and she hoped they would soon figure out that she wasn't about to change her mind. Yes, there were pictures of her with Adam Harlow—but why would anybody ever think that Adam Harlow wanted a girlfriend, or that any girl would even have him for that matter.

She still didn't know what to think of the situation and it didn't seem that the magazines did either. There was a collage of photos of Adam with various different girls, and she was one of them. She was in two photographs, bigger than the others because of her title, taken on the same day: there was Adam kissing her, and Adam laughing with his arm around her. The other pictures showed him in similar positions with girls of all shapes and colors; she felt no jealousy, but a horrible, guilty satisfaction in the fact that she was certainly the prettiest of them.

The accompanying text read, "In this edition of Harlow's Harem, there is a notable new notch in the battered bedpost of loathsome lothario **Adam Harlow** (22): Pokémon League bombshell **Delilah Peerenboom** (19), apparently unable to Protect herself from the cranky coxcomb's Pursuit. His Lovely Kiss may Charm her, but such a celebrated trainer should have more in her arsenal than Struggle and Submission—hopefully the next time our Mohicaned meanie attempts Close Combat, this thick slice of Yankee cheesecake is ready with a Low Kick!"

The use of battle moves as a literary effect among other things felt tacky and a little embarrassing, and she thought maybe she should be offended. After all, she couldn't _technically_ be called a notch in Adam's bedpost, yet.

Sex. It was Adam's forte, it was what he was known for, he gave off sex in waves, in oceans. Just standing downwind of him was enough to leave someone needing to bathe in cracked ice to cool off from all the hot, dirty sex stinging their eyes.

Perhaps it was a holdover from early American Puritanism that young people (and especially girls) were told, in Delilah's experience, that sex was a scary, scary thing, entailing excruciating pain, hidden dangers, deadly risk, and emotional stress, hinting broadly that it was ultimately not worth it. Adding an intimidating being like Adam resulted in some unholy cocktail of terror that made her want to hide in bed for the rest of her life, or at least until the next opportunity to encounter it.

Some nights in bed she lay with a pokémon sleeping on her heartbeat and wondered if people would care about her at all if she were a boy.

Most of the time she doubted it.


	19. Big Dumb Sex

**19 Big Dumb Sex**

Adam showed up at the training seminar in Pewter. Delilah didn't know if he was looking for an opening, if he had been waiting, or if it just happened so, but he approached her nonchalantly after the crowds thinned. The only people left were putting away chairs and he asked her for a match.

She sighed.

She didn't answer him for a minute, just because she wanted to annoy him.

"I don't know, Adam," she said. "I have to take a bus and then a train and then another bus."

"I do have a car, you know," he said.

"You might not be so generous if I beat you," she said.

It was going to happen. She knew it. Maybe he planned it, maybe she instigated it, maybe they took advantage of happenstance. It seemed inevitable now. She knew that he knew, too, and she knew that he knew that she knew and that she knew that he knew that she knew that he knew. The certainty unsettled her and he snapped at her for something stupid, and said that Alexander McQueen's death was "enough" for the month without her "behaviour".

"So why couldn't you battle during the actual seminar?" she asked testily when they found a court in an empty room. "Does it embarrass you to battle me?"

He looked down his nose condescendingly and said, "Only if I lose."

"I don't think it's a conditional statement if you lose every time," she said, letting the cattiness in her voice go undisguised.

For half a second he looked blazingly angry. It was thin ice, but she had an idea of what was under it and she didn't care. "We'll see," he said. "I have gotten better."

"Maybe you have," she said, "but I haven't been waiting in stagnant water for you to catch up." She felt like her legs would give out or her vision would leave her, like she would fall into a swoon if he got too close to her.

She knew how mad he was. He had been the one to kiss her first and they were both aware that that put her in a position of dominance.

Delilah knew that pride goeth before the fall but this trash talk test run turned out to be a free trial: although Adam's battling only improved, in some cases exponentially, there was no nasty shock for her. After all, she got better with every match too. Should she, she wondered, feel guilt, pity? After all of these matches she had won against Adam, his continued arrogance was almost touching.

The match seemed to be progressing naturally: she took out his pokémon systematically, though not entirely escaping conflict; still, the outlook was generally positive: he was on his last pokémon, his alakazam, which she could tell wouldn't last much longer, and she still had half her team left.

She ordered a Quick Attack, confident that this would be the end, and indeed the alakazam retreated to Adam's side, signaling that he no longer wished to battle.

But Adam didn't recall him. He patted his side with an encouraging word, attempting to will him back into battle.

Delilah watched for a minute, unsure at first what he was doing.

Then, out of nowhere, she got mad. In fact, she wasn't just mad, she was offended. She was more insulted by this than she had ever been by anything he had ever said to her.

"What are you _doing_, Adam?"

"I'm battling," he sneered.

"Recall him!" she said, angrier than she had ever been in her life. "He obviously doesn't want to fight!"

"Would you mind your own business!"

"This match is as much my business as yours!"

"Then don't interrupt me!"

"You know what? I don't have to play with you!"

She recalled Snoops.

Adam looked scandalized.

"What are you _doing_!"

"I'm not going to keep battling."

"You can't do that!"

"Then I forfeit!"

"You can't forfeit!" he shouted. "You have three pokémon left!"

"Well, you don't have any!" she shouted back. "I refuse to battle with you unless you can acknowledge that!"

He looked like he wanted to scream. "I don't get it! It doesn't make sense!"

"Just because _you_ don't understand doesn't mean it doesn't make sense!"

He glowered at her and didn't say anything. She felt like it was time for her to make a speech of some sort but she didn't have anything she wanted to say so she didn't.

They were both so mad that the air virtually whistled with electricity as they walked to his car. It was a convertible but he didn't ask if she was cold or offer to put up the top.

After he had sat down he sighed. "All right," he said as she put her bag on the floor. "You won. I thought my pokémon were stronger than they were." He looked at her levelly. "You won," he repeated.

She didn't know what to say. So she didn't say anything.

"Listen, Delilah," he said. "One day I will beat you, I'll have the strength."

She swallowed. "Strength...isn't the same as anger," she said timidly.

He stared at her with frightening intensity; she didn't want to look away, but it was making her feel like she was going to cry. She wasn't sure what he was trying to accomplish, but he didn't stop looking at her, his eyes smoldering like cigarettes, straight through her. She wanted to kiss him.

"Or power," she added.

"And what does that mean?" he sneered.

Her face flushed. "A good trainer's highest priority is to understand when his pokémon do and don't want to battle," she said. It would be so easy. "A good trainer puts his pokémon's well-being before anything else." It could be so straightforward, so artless, and so, so easy.

"Shut up." She could do it.

"Is that the best you can do? It's not about _you_, Adam. Pokémon don't exist to win _for you_." It would be rough and nasty and unburdening and so easy. "They're not Gaston, or Marie, or Smithers, or Bailey, or whatever other slaves you have working for you, serving you."

He kept staring at her, making her face hotter and hotter. If she could only do it.

"How selfish can you get?" she continued, becoming afraid that she would lose control of her voice. "Why are YOU so important?" Why couldn't she do something that was so common and unsophisticated?

"Who do you think you are, Delilah?" His tone was even, low, and very threatening.

"I don't know!" she said, almost hysterically. "I kind of thought I was the _World fucking Champion_. I guess that was a fluke, because I've been training my pokémon all wrong this whole time." It was such a simple, basic desire, to be on him, under him, against him, and she didn't trust herself to do it right.

He scowled. "And just what are you, then, the Champion, doing wasting time in my car?"

She looked up at him defiantly. "Waiting for something more interesting to happen."

He looked at her for a minute longer. Then he very slowly leaned toward her; her eyelids fluttered and she inhaled audibly, her lips parting. She waited, but he didn't kiss her; he just hovered in front of her with his eyes half-closed, breathing against her burning lips.

He thought she wouldn't kiss him.

He thought she would let him tease her.

She thought the same thing, until she grabbed his face and kissed him with unprecedented zeal. He reciprocated it admirably, but made no further advances; she kissed him as deeply and urgently as she knew how, but he didn't try to get any closer to her or touch her at all.

What was he doing? Testing her? Playing indifference? The car was open but the street was deserted, it was okay. She kissed his mouth and jaw and throat, her hand sliding down his neck and chest as she moved closer to him; she felt his fingers on her leg and it was so encouraging that she climbed on top of him, running her hands over the bristly sides of his head and kissing him voraciously.

Was she going too fast? Not fast enough? She didn't know; she didn't really know what to do or how. She understood the mechanics of sex, but how did it get to that point? Delilah had never been in this sort of commanding position with Adam before; she didn't know if she liked it, but she was pretty sure that he didn't, regardless of his hands up her skirt.

She anchored herself with an arm around the headrest, undulating experimentally against him. In his basilisk stare was hatred like she had never known and it was absolutely the most thrilling thing she had ever seen. All she wanted was to touch him and she wanted to touch him more than she could ever remember wanting anything in her life.

She pressed her breasts to his chest; he closed his eyes, his lips curling back and his eyebrows slanting up weakly, the helpless response to a physical sensation. She kissed him and he overpowered her, and she ended up trapped beneath him in a frenzied mess of groping limbs and grunting breath. Was she really going to lose her virginity in a car? No matter how expensive it was, how tacky, how cliché, how high school, but she didn't care. She could hardly believe it was actually happening anyway—she wanted to touch him and be touched by him and that was what was happening, she wanted it so much and she was getting it.

He was clawing frantically at his belt while she was wondering if she should ask if he had a condom when there was a tapping noise on the driver-side door and a voice said, "Arise, young lovers..."

Adam sat up quickly and Delilah scrabbled upright when she saw a policeman standing outside the car. Tacky, cliché, high school.

"Are you addressing me, Officer?" asked Adam, crimsoned but quite calm.

"Unless you were taking a nap?" said the policeman, eyeing skeptically the suspicious trail of lipstick down Adam's neck.

"Would I be in trouble if I was?"

"Was the young lady napping, as well?"

"How would I know, if I was asleep?"

The policeman pointed his collapsed baton at him. "Don't get smart," he said.

"It doesn't suit you," agreed Delilah, adjusting her bra.

"Shut up, Delilah," spat Adam.

She put up her hands innocently.

"However intriguing this relationship may be," said the cop, "it need not crescendo in public. Right?" He was looking pointedly at Adam.

"Well, it wasn't _my_ idea," said Adam, sounding vaguely offended. "She started it."

"Oh, one of these intelligent conversations, eh?" asked the cop, and looked at Delilah. "Well, go ahead and deny that you started it."

"Oh, no, I did start it," she said. "I guess I just didn't pick up on the fact that he wasn't interested."

The policeman snorted and Adam snapped, "Delilah, shut the fuck up."

"Uhh...what?" she laughed warningly. "I am not doing a thing wrong."

"You're being completely fucking stupid, is what you're doing," he said. "Stop acting so much like yourself."

She hit him. The intensity of the sound was shocking, singing sharply through the still night.

"I hate you!"

She stepped out of the car and slammed the door.

"I'll take the bus home!"

"Home is a good place to be this time of night, miss," said the cop. "See that you get there."

"Uh, okay," she said unnaturally, unsure if she should address him as "sir".

"And I don't want to see you again," she heard him say to Adam as she walked away. "Or I'll have you brought in for impersonating a human being..."

She turned the corner and got to the bus stop. She felt like she could barely walk. She couldn't believe she had actually slapped him, and she couldn't believe how hard. She had never hit anybody before; she had done it in her dreams a couple of times, but it was always anti-climactic, as if there were some unseen force preventing her from hitting with her full strength.

She stood at the bus stop, and sighed, and reached up to fix her hair. So she had done it now, she had hit Adam in the face. It had been with an open palm, but hard enough that it stung her hand. She was surprised that the cop hadn't at least warned her about assault charges.

She felt a presence behind her and a hand on her shoulder; for the briefest of seconds she thought it might be Adam in an unlikely fit of sexually-charged penitence, but she realized this was spectacularly improbable even before the presence slurred something unintelligible to her.

"Uhh," she replied.

"Now you've dumped the punk, I can tell..." His words turned again into meaningless gibberish while his hand strayed lower and she wondered where that policeman had gone.

"Uhh," she said again.

He started muttering something messed up in her ear and she was so nervous that she just stood there frozen because he was really messed up and she wasn't sure what he would do next so she started preparing herself for a brutal rape scene in the bus stop which conveniently had no working lights.

She was reaching for a poké ball for defense when somebody shouted: "Hey!"

It was Adam, holding Delilah's handbag, which he threw on the ground. He ran over and shoved the guy, who fell down.

"Get the fuck away!" Adam yelled.

The man got to his feet and ran away, all spastic and mumbly.

Delilah immediately felt stupid. She shouldn't have needed someone to save her. Maybe she should have been grateful; instead, she was just embarrassed.

"Thanks," she said quietly.

Adam sneered contemptuously, and walked away.

It was the first time she had ever hated somebody who actually deserved it. As she got on the bus she could only think about her underwear because she knew that when she took them off there would be a big wet spot. It was probably good that they hadn't had sex because Adam's toxic semen would have probably left horrible slime stains. And what about horrible diseases. There was herpes and pubic lice and smallpox and pregnancy to worry about. Maybe he was full of so many potent chemicals that they balanced out all the lethal infections.

She wasn't sure how she could be so profoundly attracted to somebody so revolting.

A man on the bus surprised her by asking if she was all right, and she said she was. She could tell he didn't believe her but he just smiled.


	20. I Need a Slave

_Hey guys, over at my LJ I went on a long diatribe about a few aspects of the fanfiction concept. Again you may find it interesting or you may really, really not. Thanks for reading!_

**20 I Need a Slave**

The swankier a press party, the more paparazzi there were; Delilah generally let them take pictures, because she figured the more there were the less they were worth.

"Hey, Delilah, how are you? How's it going?"

"Delilah—hey, Delilah!"

"Hey, Delilah, are you dating Adam? Adam Harlow? Are you dating, are you guys dating? Hey Delilah—"

"Do you like Christina Hendricks? Are you a fan?"

"Hey, Delilah—over here—"

"Can I get an opinion on Photoshopping? What's your opinion on Photoshopping?"

"Hey, Delilah, are you dating Adam Harlow? Delilah? Are you sleeping with him?"

"Can we get an opinion on Photoshopping? Do you disagree with it?"

One of the policemen threw his coat over her bare shoulders. "Give her some room, fellas," he called, walking alongside her and Mr Driscoll to the car.

She slept in her evening gown on the way back from London and got up the next morning to go to the gym. As she came up to the street corner there was a man with no teeth waiting to cross the street perpendicular to hers. He coughed a frightening, guttural cough without covering his mouth and then rasped to her, "Carsh enneh fuhn ger!"

She blinked. "What?"

"Fenneh grash keh nanna!"

She still didn't understand. "What?" she repeated.

"Everybody's coughing!" he said. "Everybody's sick! But I'm not sick, I'm drunk!"

She blinked. "Uh-huh," she said, and crossed the street.

Her drunken homeless encounters quota exploded while she was in Pewter. As she took out her Pokégear to check the time, she saw two men on the next block, one holding a bottle in a paper bag. The other one said to her as she walked by, "Hello."

"Hi," she said.

"Oooh! Don't look at me like that!" he said, turning to follow her as she passed by.

Her face had been blank, so she didn't know what he was talking about.

"Where are you going?" he asked. "Where are you going, love?"

"To the gym," she said, gesturing down the street. "The pokémon gym."

"Well, listen to you," he said. "Where are you from, my little darling?"

She said California and he started to sing a Beach Boys song. She wasn't sure what to make of it; he wasn't threatening but he smelled terrible and the other one said next to nothing, occasionally taking a swig from his bag.

He asked her for her phone number but then realized he didn't have his phone with him. Perhaps she was being a snob, but she found it hard to believe he even had a phone—they _had_ to be homeless. She had still been holding her Pokégear, and he grabbed it right out of her hand and started trying to put his number in it.

"Hey—!"

"Crikey, look at this thing," he said, pressing buttons. "What is this, anyway?"

It started to ring, and she grabbed it back, only to have her psychological welfare threatened by Adam's name on the screen.

"OooOOoooh, it's her _boyfriend_," sang the homeless man.

She was saved from having to decide whether or not to answer the call when he grabbed the Pokégear back again and finished putting his number in the directory.

It took until she was inside the gym to realize that she probably should have been worried that he was trying to steal her Pokégear. She decided to pretend she didn't know Adam had called her. After all, if she had left the pokémon center just a few minutes earlier, she would have already been in the gym when he called, and she would have missed it because she would have been training. So that made sense.

Maybe he would try to call her again, or maybe he would wait for her to return his call. Either way, at least now she could figure out something to say to him. She couldn't imagine what he wanted to say to her. She didn't really think he would apologize—and anyway, if he had to apologize, she did too, and she didn't really want to, because she wasn't sorry, and she didn't think he was either.

Organizing the way she felt about Adam was confusing and frustrating. She couldn't not think about it, about the way he felt against her, and the look on his face, his handsome features contorted with desire; she wanted to see him make that face again, she wanted to excite him, upset him, please him, anger him, thrill him, she wanted him to feel the things he made her feel.

She wondered if he thought about her. She wondered what he thought about her, and when, and how often. She wondered what he thought about doing to her and what he did to himself instead. She wondered if his thoughts were anything like hers.

She trained at the gym later than she usually did, aware that it was only because she didn't want to talk to him; when the gym closed, David, a cute and very gay Scottish man with whom she had been training, invited her to eat with him and some of his friends.

Obviously she accepted; if she went home, she would have to check her Pokégear and discover a missed call from Adam and manners would obligate her to call him back. If she went out to eat, she would come back late, and manners would obligate her to wait until the next day because she wouldn't want to wake him up of course. Besides, David was funny and friendly even if she could barely understand anything he said. In the loud restaurant she felt marginally less rude asking that everything be repeated. The only thing she understood without question was "aye", which was actually good, because "aye" made up about 65% of his conversation.

As they ate David showed her a picture on his cell phone of his mustachioed friend Neil wearing a thong with a pink feather boa looping through it. There were two of them, exactly the same except that in the second he wasn't sucking in his stomach. David flipped between them to make her laugh; Neil, who was sitting across the table from her, winked at her incessantly throughout the evening. At first she wasn't sure what to think of it, because he was much older and she was pretty sure he was gay too, but then she noticed he did it to everybody.

It was very loud and dimly lit in the restaurant but she didn't mind if she sat there forever, listening to everyone at the table recite Robert Burns poetry as they got progressively drunker. David was very, very blond, his eyebrows and eyelashes so white it looked as if snow had fallen on his face, and his alcohol flush was quite striking.

But for various legal reasons she couldn't sit there forever and so at some point was back at the pokémon center. She went through the motions of checking her Pokégear for missed calls and what do you know there was one from Adam, but darn the luck if it weren't already midnight. He might have been in bed and who could say.

The smell of Indian takeaway was very comforting on a rainy April Sunday. She crouched down to pet Beau, who sniffed interestedly at the box.

"I don't think that's anything you'd want," she said, letting him smell it.

Adam called again and she knew that if she didn't answer again it would look pretty stupid.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Delilah."

"Hi..."

There was a heavy silence.

"Um, you're the one who called me," she reminded him.

"I know, yeah."

"Are you still mad at me?"

He sighed.

She poked at her chana masala.

"No. I mean, I wasn't mad at you."

"It kind of seemed like you were..."

He sighed again. "Look," he said. "Where are you right now? You're not still in Celadon, are you?"

"I'm in Pewter."

"Oh," he said. There was another pause. "Well, will you be coming to Viridian?"

"Yes, I had planned to go there next."

"Well...why don't you...if you want to, when you're here, why don't you come by and see me sometime."

"Um...okay," she said, unsure if he had evoked Mae West intentionally or unfortunately.

So what did that mean, to "come by and see" him? Severed communication with Adam was easy enough but suddenly she was thrown back into a relation for which she was thoroughly unqualified. Delilah wasn't ashamed of being a virgin but she suddenly felt very incompetent and bumbling. She disliked the feeling of being illiterate in any subject and this was a test for which she had no practical training. She could talk about sexuality hypothetically, with facts and figures and diagrams, but did it mean anything? Was theory good enough?

If they did have sex, what would happen next? Probably nothing. Probably they would continue to have the same tentative, tumultuous friendship, just with sex in it. But wouldn't that be the ideal relationship to have with Adam? To only see each other to have sex, and just not deal with each other at all otherwise?

When there was sexual tension in sitcoms, the quality of the show usually suffered so that the characters could pursue a relationship together (and sometimes this happened even without the sexual tension). The reason this so often was typical of a decline was because it went against what a sitcom was supposed to be: the defining characteristic of a situation comedy was that the situation never changed. The characters were static and easily defined, leading to relationships that were static and easily defined.

But real people were dynamic and always changing, affected by every experience and event. And if people were changing all the time, how could any relationship be constant? Relationships were altered by every passing second based on how the involved parties interacted (or didn't interact).

Negative space was still space.


	21. I Wanna Be Your Dog

**21 I Wanna Be Your Dog**

People seemed to think it was funny to offer Delilah sips of their drinks and then laugh at the faces she made. "You can't even really taste the alcohol," said Eusine.

"I don't know, I really hate beer," she said.

"It doesn't taste like beer," he said, handing her his glass. "It tastes better. It's finer."

She took a sip.

Her face contorted naturally, but she exaggerated it to make him laugh.

"Ugh! It tastes like medicine!"

"Let's play MASH," said Eusine, flipping over his placemat to the white side.

"Oh, are you playing MASH?" Whitney asked arbitrarily.

"Who are you playing MASH for?" asked Delilah.

Eusine smiled and pointed to Delilah with a blue crayon. "Okay, husbands first," he said, writing _Boys_ as the first heading. "What's the _Twilight_ guy's name?"

"Robert Pattinson?" asked Delilah. "Do you mean the actor?"

"Isn't that the other one?" asked Whitney.

"No, that's Taylor Lautner," said Irwin.

"We'll put him too," said Eusine, adding _TL_ under _RP._ "And Lance Siegfried...and let's put...Obama, because did you ever notice his initials are 'BO'..."

"If I married him," said Delilah, "my initials would be..._d'oh_!"

"Mine would be..._whoa_," said Whitney.

"Okay, cars," said Eusine, writing the next heading. "Whitney's back..."

"A garbage truck," said Irwin.

"A lawnmower," said Delilah.

"Whitney's _back_?" said Whitney.

Eusine, Whitney, and Irwin came to visit her in the spring, and came to a party thrown for her. There was a montage of her famous matches, and then a black-and-white photo of her looking very glamorous. That was when she stepped out onto the stage, and the audience rose to their feet, clapping and cheering.

Standing between a rolling sea of applause and a gigantic picture of herself, she suddenly felt very small and shy. She made an "oh go on" hand gesture of campy false modesty, and the applause turned to laughter and then finally subsided so she could make a speech.

"Oh, Delilah, my sweetheart!" exclaimed Eusine when she was done, wrapping his arm around her and pretending to weep into her shoulder. "It's so hard for me to believe you're a great big pokémon master now!"

"Oh, there, there," she said, stroking his hair.

"Oh, look at you, the utter toast of women's liberationists! I'm so proud..."

The next day Delilah had a publicity photoshoot, but she was able to meet with them for dinner to hear about their adventures.

"Don't you think this would be a neat tattoo?" said Eusine, touching the back of his t-shirt, which had some sort of artsy Celtic graphic on it.

"Yeah, that would look cool," said Delilah.

"No, don't get a tattoo, Eusine," said Whitney. "Tattoos are stupid."

"I have to get a tattoo," said Eusine. "I won't be young forever! I've had everything pierced, I have to get a tattoo."

"What have you had pierced?" asked Delilah. "I didn't know that." She had figured he had had his eyebrows pierced because of a couple of odd scars there.

"I had my ears pierced," he said. "And my eyebrows, and I had a labret. I had a septum piercing for a while but not very long."

"But those healed over," said Whitney. "Tattoos aren't going to heal."

"You know, when you think about it," said Delilah, "tattoos are technically dyed scars."

"They are so gross," said Whitney.

Eusine ignored her. "Falkner's the one who made me want a tattoo," said Eusine. "He has Alice on his arm, with, like, cards behind her. It's so cute. And of course Adam Harlow has got that rather alluring feraligatr—"

"Do you see a lot of Adam?" asked Whitney.

"Um...I see him now and then, here and there," said Delilah.

"You don't hang out much?" she asked. "Then who do you hang out with?"

Delilah shrugged. "Nobody, really," she said. "I'm a lot busier than I was this time last year."

She didn't really want to talk about Adam and was attempting to veer the conversation in another direction, but apparently Adam was just too attractive a discussion topic. "God, Adam fucking hates me," said Irwin, laughing. "Like, if he found out I was with you when you bought that dress, he would automatically hate it."

"I doubt it's that serious," said Eusine. "I think that's just him, I think everybody probably gets the feeling that Adam hates them."

"Um...no," Irwin disagreed gently. "I'm pretty sure he legitimately, explicitly hates me."

"He just gives off a really scary vibe," said Whitney, "because he's just so fucking INTENSE." She made some hand gestures to elaborate. "Like, one time, he was at my gym, probably a year ago, and he was just _staring_ at me, with no expression. I thought maybe he was just like spacing out, or looking at something behind me, but then I looked at him, and our eyes totally met, but he didn't look away! He just kept staring at me! And I mean I looked away, like you do when you accidentally meet eyes with somebody, but then I looked back, and he was _still staring at me_! And he just slooowly looked away...not even embarrassed..."

"Whitney, you think everybody's staring at you," said Eusine. "You always think everybody is saying your name. Conceited..."

"Shut up! He was totally staring at me!"

"No, that's just like this kid I went to middle school with," said Irwin. "He would always do shit like that. I could never tell if he was looking at me or just at the clock or something. He was seventeen or something—it was like, dude, you're not _twelve_. He had a beard, practically. And then one day he got picked up after school in a convertible by this tall blonde lady, and he got in the car by, you know, jumping over the door? Like, dude. That's _not_ your _mom_."

"I always thought you and Adam were so funny together, though, Delilah," said Whitney relentlessly. "I'm surprised you wouldn't hang out more."

"Yeah, well," said Delilah. She didn't want to try to explain it to them so she went back to the last subject: "There's a guy I train with sometimes who has a tattoo on his arm, and it's a Jolly Roger, except instead of a skull and crossbones it's a stack of pancakes and a fork and knife."

"I've seen a tattoo of Aunt Jemima," said Irwin.

Whitney laughed. "Okay, I'm converted," she said.

"That's what I want," said Eusine. "Aunt Jemima, and Mrs Butterworth. In a mud fight."

"A mud fight?" said Irwin. "Come on, you mean a syrup fight."

"Do British people eat pancakes?" asked Whitney.

"Don't be stupid, Whitney," said Eusine. "The British eat _crumpets_." He released a trill of particularly SpongeBob-ish laughter.

"Well, I was just _asking_!"

"Morty and I had baked pancakes once at Richard Walker's," said Eusine. "They changed my life." He stopped. "I miss my little Morty," he said, pretending to wipe a tear from his eye.

"Why did he decide not to come?" asked Delilah.

"Well, every gym leader in Johto can't holiday at the same time, _Whitney_," he said accusingly.

"Oh, shut up," said Whitney.

Seeing them again was nice, if a little strange. It had been a few months since the last time and so required a certain amount of starting over. They did some tourist things in London, and also went to Paris for a couple of days, and met Eusine's parents, who lived in Celadon. Morty and Eusine had met when Morty had been on a sabbatical to train in Kanto, and apparently they had fallen in love and Eusine had made the move to Johto.

Delilah couldn't always be around because of her previous commitments; when this was the case, Eusine said he had wanted to visit some local clubs, only to quickly tire of hearing "Girls Just Want to Have Fun", "9 to 5", "Video Killed the Radio Star", and the _Baywatch_ theme over and over again. Goldenrod wasn't London, but Celadon wasn't even Goldenrod; so after that their Kanto excursions returned to more typical tourist destinations like the Indigo Plateau and the Pewter Museum of Science.

When they went home she felt a strange emptiness, a ragged absence of emotion. She had a badge from the Pewter Gym, so it was time to move on to the next one, to Viridian, and an Earth Badge, and Adam. On her first day staying in a Viridian hotel (Mr Driscoll insisted she no longer stay in pokémon centers, for the sake of privacy) she had to go to a nice reception, and she spent most of the evening looking around in exhausted paranoia, waiting to see a pair of buckled winklepickers or a striped Ann Demeulemeester jacket. But apparently he wasn't there.

Oh, if only they had done it! She tried to imagine what might have happened if that police officer hadn't stopped them. She remembered the way it felt to have the weight of Adam's body on her, the barbell through his tongue skating masterfully across the roof of her mouth. Boy, he was a disgusting piece of work.

Probably they would not have removed any more clothing than was necessary. She remembered how cold his hand was in her thighs. Probably he would have been able to tell she had never done it before. Maybe he could already tell. Maybe he would have said, "You're a virgin," and then maybe she would have said, "Not anymore," and then maybe he would have been angered by her tone, and maybe it would hurt. So then probably they would take greedily from each other for a few minutes, things they had wanted for a long time, and then...

And then what? After he shipwrecked himself in her legs, after she gasped rhapsodically to him, after the shuddering relief of frustration, what would happen immediately afterward? It probably wouldn't be a period of relaxation and contentment with the world. They would probably be dirty and ashamed and take it out on each other.

The tension between them ran more broadly than the mundanity of sexual attraction. Yes, he was a boy and she was a girl, that much was true, but they were also both people, and for various reasons sometimes people didn't like each other. It wasn't shyness that had kept them at arm's length of each other.

She wondered why Lance was a Champion for everybody, but she had to be a self-esteem tool for fifteen-year-old girls who thought they weren't thin enough.


	22. Identity

**22 Identity**

She figured she would just be frank and upfront about it. They could discharge this sexual congestion directly and efficiently and be done with it. There was no reason to be coy. It was distracting her from other things.

So maybe it made her a slut, she thought on the way to his house. She didn't care. So maybe she _was_ only interested in his body, in his well-trafficked genitals; what was wrong with that? So maybe he _was_ attractive to her because of the glamour, the heady danger he radiated. So maybe it _was_ silly and foolish and frivolous. What was so bad about being inane and dumb and superficial if she was okay with it?

The door was answered by the butler and when Adam appeared behind him holding a glass of Bollinger she was tongue-tied and embarrassed, confronted with the fact that she was completely out of her league. She had absolutely no idea what she was talking about—how could she possibly think about sex like that when she lacked any authority on the matter? She felt so inelegant and unworldly next to Adam who seemed so much older and more sophisticated in his Junya Watanabe and hand-tailored waistcoat.

"Hi, Delilah. What a sweet dress."

"Thanks. Irwin helped me pick it out."

"—Except, of course, for the rubbish fabric."

"...Oh."

"And the cheap cut."

"I..."

"Not to mention the execrable construction."

"Well..."

"I'm quite busy right now, Delilah, but the next time you need someone's help shopping you might go to someone with taste."

Well.

Adam could certainly make a point.

She started to walk back to the street. She knew that Adam probably only said it to hurt her feelings, but she felt her eyes start to water anyway. Her chin wrinkled and she choked out something that was half a sob and half a laugh, the Harlows' beautiful front grounds blurring in front of her like a wet newspaper.

"Delilah!"

She turned to see Adam's father coming towards her from the front door, and she quickly wiped her eyes on her wrist and smiled overcompensatingly as he approached.

"I heard my son give you his critique of your dress," he said. "Why don't we buy you a dress of the most painstaking quality and see what he thinks?"

"Oh," she sniffed, wiping her eyes again. "I don't...you don't have to do that."

"Maybe not," he said, "but I would really like to. It's the least I can do, for the abuse you suffer at Adam's hands."

Delilah thought that if Giovanni bought clothes for every person abused by Adam, it was a wonder that they were still so rich.

"I insist," he said, leading her to the garage. "At his best, Adam personifies a good 50% of the cardinal sins, and it can do no harm to occasionally take the piss out of his vinegar..."

Leaning against the garage outside were a few panes of glass. "Are you having windows replaced?" she asked.

"No, those used to be mirrors," he said. "Adam wore them out and they don't work anymore. Now they're just plates of glass and we must throw them away..."

She smiled but looked away because she thought he was being a little too obvious about trying to cheer her up.

"I apologise for his rudeness," he said in the car.

"It's okay," she said quietly.

"It's really a lovely dress, and you look lovely in it," he insisted.

"Thank you," she mumbled.

"He is a bit of a jealous fusspot," he sighed. "That's all..."

She looked out the window and didn't say anything.

Giovanni seemed to want to say something more, but he didn't.

He took her to a boutique where the clothes were so expensive that the prices weren't even put on the tags.

But what clothes!

She was almost scared to try them on. They were nicer even than anything she had worn for a photoshoot. Giovanni proclaimed several beautiful garments "hideous" and "vile", "unfit for the wretchedest of Croatian prostitutes" while attendants scurried back and forth attempting to please him with terror and devotion, but when he found something he liked he declared, "Why, with a dress like that, even I could date Adam!"

Delilah had read a few teen romance novels that assigned a certain magical power to beautiful clothing and she supposed that this was what he was referring to. It was a terribly beautiful dress with a very flattering ruched bodice and she thought she looked like a movie star, but unfortunately her undergarments that day were too dark and showed through the white jersey, so it was back to hearing how some gorgeous dress would only be appropriate on a blacksmith's wife lugging pails of water from a hand pump "in the fields".

Once he was satisfied with having worn every shop employee to a quivering pile of humiliation in its liquid form, he bought her a pink dress with a deep neckline, which he told her to wear out, and he would have the shop deliver her other clothes to the hotel for her.

When they returned to the house Giovanni told her to wait a minute before ringing the bell so that he could have Adam answer the door; when he did, drink still in hand, he looked her over and said, "Oh, hello again, Delilah. Another new dress?"

"Do you like this one any better?" she asked.

"Did Irwin help you with this one too?"

"No, someone else helped me pick this one out."

Adam tsked and sighed exasperatedly. "I told you to come to me!" he said, leaning his hand on the doorframe. "As impossible as it sounds, this clot's got even less taste than Irwin! What thick old bastard was it this time?"

"You call him 'Daddy', sweetheart," Giovanni called from the parlor.

Adam squawked agitatedly, and Delilah burst out laughing. He stood there looking like a purugly being petted backwards and she "suddenly" felt awkward.

"What's the matter?" she asked pointlessly.

"I'm not happy," he pouted.

She did something stupid then.

She laughed.

Adam smashed his glass against the wall and then swept his arm across the console table under the mirror, crashing stemware and flowers and picture frames to the ground.

As he kicked the table over, Giovanni rushed in asking what was going on.

Adam stomped past him and up the stairs.

"I hate this _house_!" he yelled from the staircase. "And I HATE these _STAIRS_!"

Giovanni shook his head in skeptical exasperation as Adam's angry footfalls continued, reaching a climax as he slammed a door. Apparently the slam didn't meet his exacting standards because then the door opened again and slammed harder.

"He hates the _stairs_," Giovanni sighed, looking pleadingly to the heavens. "It's always something..."

He righted the table as the maid came in with a dustpan. "Oh, dear," she said. Apparently it had happened before.

"It seems you've hurt his feelings," said Giovanni. It almost sounded like a compliment.

Delilah shrugged, unsure what to say. He invited her into the parlor where he was sorting through old photographs and she had to wonder how much work it really was being the head of a massive criminal organization if he spent so much time just kind of hanging out. Maybe it was like being a school principal and mostly involved business lunches while the vice principal had to deal with all the bratty kids. Ivy seemed to be out at another charity function or whatever.

There was a photo of them from the previous summer. Adam, as white as ever in the Mediterranean sun, was wearing seersucker espadrilles and a Velvet Underground t-shirt with a swimsuit; Ivy, Lanvin; and Giovanni, tortoiseshell sunglasses. All in all, they looked like vaguely 1960s movie stars, as apparently per usual.

There were a couple of pictures of Giovanni and Ivy at their wedding, which was of course beautiful, and then there was Adam as a skinny ten-year-old with a crab line at a Vermilion rockpool; Ivy crouched next to him pointing at something and holding fish and chips wrapped in paper. How British, she thought.

"Delilah, I'd like to ask you something."

"Okay," she said.

"Do you know how I make money? Do you know what I do?"

She wasn't sure how to answer. "I guess I have an idea," she said uncertainly.

He looked at her seriously. "Then you have more than most," he said. "You're in an awfully powerful position."

She didn't know what to say.

"But then," he said, "so am I."

"Yeah," she agreed lamely.

He continued looking at her for a while. Then, quite without warning, he laughed. She just smiled uncomfortably, not sure where he was going with this. "You've charmed me, Delilah," he said. "For somebody else's father, you might be a gift."

He paused for a moment, and there was something strange and sad about him.

"But for me," he said, "you are a prize."

She didn't know what he meant, but it made the hairs on her arms stand up.

"I'll give you a tip, a secret: one must work hard for success," he professed. "You must start at the bottom, and work your way up."

"Is that what you did?"

"Well...not exactly," he admitted modestly. "I started at the top and worked my way up."

She laughed. "Well, I guess you Harlows just have natural business smarts."

"Well, one of us has, anyway," he said. "Very lucky for his worthless progeny, he of the room temperature IQ..."

"Is this him?" she asked, handing him a picture of Ivy in an evening gown with her arm around a very young Adam.

"I think he was six years old in this photograph. Of course, he's much bigger and uglier now."

"Maybe," she said.

Giovanni didn't say anything for a few moments, staring at the photograph with an odd look on his face. "You know, when he was sixteen," he said, "he found a loophole in his school's credit system and figured out that he didn't need to continue attending classes."

She smiled, but there was something in his voice that made her sort of sad.

"They let him run errands and things instead," he said as he dropped the photo on the table. "That was when I got him a job at Lodge's shop in town...that lasted all of three hours..."

The doorbell rang.

"Adam can get that," said Giovanni. "He could use some responsibilities."

The bell rang a few more times before Adam came thundering down the stairs wailing, "Must I do _everything_ around here...?"

He opened the door and a man said, "Garden workers. We're here to look at your lawn."

"Yes, we keep it outside," Adam sniffed disdainfully before discharging this responsibility to the butler who had made his reappearance.

He glanced into the room and Giovanni stood up. "Well!" he said, gesturing. "Chi si vede!"

Adam saw Delilah and stopped. "What's she doing here?" he asked.

"She?" Giovanni looked at Delilah, then back to Adam. "She followed me home," he said smugly.

Adam frowned. "You had better not ask me if you can keep her," he said.

"Can I ask you that?" asked Delilah.

Adam looked at her. "Delilah, can I ask you a question?"

"Yeah," she said, a little bit surprised.

"Why don't you go home and stop bothering me?"

Her breath stopped.

"Delilah, just go..._GO_...away. Just go away! I don't want to deal with you anymore!"

She looked away. Giovanni gripped Adam's arm, yanking him closer. "There is insufficient _contempt_," he hissed, his eyes blazing icily, "for the man who would offend a _woman_—even in _anger_."

"Don't touch me!" cried Adam, jerking his arm away violently.

"What's wrong with you?" His voice was hushed as if in awe and slightly shaking with rage.

"You don't care!"

"How dare you! I care rather a lot more than _you_ do!"

Adam was silent. He looked at Giovanni, at Delilah, at the persian lying under a window. When he spoke next he didn't look at him and his voice sounded uncustomarily, almost childishly soft: "I'm feeling worried, Daddy."

"Rubbish," said Giovanni. "Worry is for poor people."

Adam looked upset. "God, I hate you," he said.

"Adam—be nice," scolded Giovanni.

Adam exploded. "BE NICE!" he shrieked. "Be NICE? I hate that word! I'm fucking sick of that word! Nice, nice, nice! It's all I ever hear! Is that all that matters in the world! Isn't it NICE to see you looking so NICE on this NICE fucking day!"

"As if you can talk!" Giovanni objected. "Every other word out of your mouth is 'fuck'! Fuck this, fuck that, fuck off, fucking fuck fuck fuck! How ugly! You're not the only one that gets annoyed!"

"Oh, isn't that nice!" Adam yelled. "That really makes me want to do something nice for you nice people! And we'll have just a charming, sweet, nice little day, indeed! You lovely man!"

"What the fuck!" Giovanni replied. "Fuck it, fuck you, fuck me! Fuck around, fuck up, fuck over, motherfucker!"

"Oh, pretty pretty pretty, oh GOOD, oh, most precious! Nice nice little old darling me!"

"For fuck's sake! Go ahead and fuck yourself to death! Fuck the whole country for all I fucking care!"

"I already have, Daddykins! AND IT WAS FUCKING NICE!"

Adam grabbed whatever was nearest to him—a chair—and threw it.

It wasn't a chair made of balsa wood. It wasn't designed to fly and fall apart. It wasn't a prop. It was dark Cuban mahogany, probably old and definitely expensive, hand-carved and upholstered in Italian silk.

It broke. It shattered. It splintered in two against the wall, and left a mark. Delilah heard her breath come in sharply.

"I LIKE FUCKING!" Adam screamed hysterically, shouting it with his entire body.

He waited with every wiry sinew tensed like a spring trap, glitter hanging in his eyelashes while his chest rose and fell.

Giovanni looked at the broken chair. His eyes narrowed.

"You rotten child," he said slowly. "You're not even ashamed." He turned to Delilah and said, "I'm sorry you've had to see this." He waved to the butler, who came to show her out.

Adam shouted desperately, "Oh, right! My shameless rottenness is too horrible for female eyes! A good job you're here to cover it up, to make everything perfect and nice again!"

"Now, you listen," said Giovanni. "I feed you. I clothe you. I sent you to school. I pay for everything you do, Team Rocket pays for it all. Your mother and I could have decided not to have you at all. Don't you think that you..."

The door closed before Delilah could hear any more.

When she got back to the hotel, there were two pale pink parcels sitting on the desk, with the name of the boutique on them. In the first one was the black dress she had worn that day. Then she opened the second one and pushed away the tissue paper.

It was the beautiful white dress. She touched the ruched bodice, not knowing what to think or how she felt. She was sort of shaken, sort of nervous.

She was scared. She was scared of Adam. She was scared of herself and her future and people and the world. She was scared of the dark and throwing up and clowns. She was scared of everything and it frustrated her because she didn't want it that way.

She was nervous. She was anxious. She was stupid. She was lonely. She was sad. She was worthless. She was angry. She was weak. She was so lost and she didn't know how it happened.

Intelligence meant that you understood things and you knew how things worked. If ignorance was the only way to bliss, it meant that things were inherently bad, and the only way to be happy was if you didn't know about them. But why should that be true? She wasn't in any position to reject an idea until it became an impossibility.

But nothing was impossible, was it?

And if anything was possible, you started to feel doubtful and suspicious of everything you thought you knew. Because maybe you were wrong.

You never know.

Delilah was scared.

She didn't know why.

She didn't feel like she knew anything anymore.


	23. Hardest Bastard

**23 Hardest Bastard**

Delilah had only been in her room for a little while when there was a knock at her door.

"Oh, hello," she said. It was Bailey who had just driven her home.

"Hello again," he said. "I've been sent to come and get you."

"Come and get me?" she repeated. "Why?"

"Orders from the Boss," he said, shrugging powerlessly, "who _shall_ remain nameless..."

In the car she had to wonder how he knew what room she was in.

Actually she found that she didn't really care if it ended up that Giovanni was doing paranoid stuff to her because it wasn't like she really had anything interesting to hide from him. The things Delilah usually hid from people were really quite mundane, for example she never told people about the time in kindergarten when she had peed her pants simply because she didn't feel like asking where the bathroom was. But maybe it would be cathartic to talk about it in her next interview.

Maybe Giovanni was trying to establish a harmonious rapport with her and buy her things so she wouldn't change her mind about keeping quiet about Team Rocket. She wondered for a moment how much of that sort of thing was present in Ivy's life. Ivy seemed intelligent and it seemed like she and Giovanni probably loved each other, but she did have shades of trophy wife about her, and Delilah figured there was some amount of politics involved in their marriage.

Benson took her to a restaurant where she found Giovanni and Adam sitting very subdued and tense. "You are looking especially beautiful today, Delilah," Giovanni greeted her warmly. "Isn't she beautiful, Adam?"

Adam didn't say anything.

"What an idiot you are," Giovanni muttered.

Delilah was very uncomfortable. She made a stupid face at Adam and said, "Aren't I beautiful, Adam?"

He cracked a reluctant smile and looked at the menu.

"Don't bother with him," said Giovanni. "He's not worth it."

"Everyone's worth a laugh," she disagreed. "Even Adam."

"Well, don't tell him so. Adam can't take a joke for anything."

"Luckily, that won't stop me making them..."

"It would be nice if he would involve himself in the conversation," said Giovanni as the waiter brought their drinks. "I wonder how much he likes us talking about him as if he weren't here."

"I certainly don't like it," said Delilah.

"No?" He laughed slightly. "Why's that?"

"Talk about awkward," she said. "I feel like I'm asking you for his hand in marriage."

He laughed. "Hmm," he said. "I think I'd have to say no."

"Oh? On what grounds?"

"If you took his hand, I'd be stuck with the rest of him."

She laughed. "All or nothing, huh?"

"You know I would only allow the best," said Giovanni. "Would it be a love match?"

"Of course! Head over heels."

"You're not after money, then?"

"Why, what did you think I was in love with?"

He laughed genuinely. "I guess nobody would take Adam for himself," he said.

"Shut up," Adam mumbled.

"Speaking again?" asked Giovanni rhetorically. "I suppose you think you're a regular Melanie Wilkes?"

"Shut _up_," Adam repeated, still looking motionlessly down at the menu. "You don't know anything."

"I know how rude you can be," Giovanni scolded him sharply. "You were so rude to poor Delilah this morning that she left in tears."

Adam didn't say anything.

He continued not saying anything and not looking at either of them for the remainder of the meal. Delilah continued chatting awkwardly with Giovanni until he had to go to a business meeting and she felt a certain dread at being left with Adam.

"Thank you for coming," said Giovanni, kissing her on the cheek. "It was nice to see you."

He went to kiss Adam, but then seemed to think better of it.

"Well, I'll see you later. And you be nice to her," he added grimly to Adam.

Adam didn't answer, and Giovanni left. She felt extremely uneasy.

Why had she come?

What was she doing there?

Should she say something?

She made anxious play with the edge of her napkin.

Adam still didn't move.

What was she supposed to do?

What was the point of all this?

Was it supposed to be some kind of peace offering?

Did that woman think nobody could see her cleaning her fingernails with the edge of her menu?

Could she really fault Team Rocket when she ate meat and wore leather?

Did she need to give Toast a bath?

"You don't have to be nice to me," she finally said, attempting a joke. "You can just be yourself."

He started to laugh.

It turned into something else.

"Fuck!"

He wiped his eyes with the palm of his hand. Delilah wasn't sure what to say, so she didn't say anything.

"I'm...I'm s-so _bored_ of all this," he sobbed. "And I'm _just—so—angry_...!"

He wept into his hand for the next few minutes while Delilah looked at the table.

She didn't know what to do. It seemed that the generally accepted reaction would be for her to hug him and say, "I know how you feel."

But she didn't know how he felt. Barring scientifically questionable psychic bonds, it was just not possible for anybody to _know_ specifically how another person felt. There were too many possible factors a person could be ignorant of. Every instance of an emotion was as unique as the situation that resulted in it. She could never know how anybody else felt and nobody could ever know how she felt, about anything.

Eventually the crying became sniffing and she dared to look at him. His eyelids were swollen and his scleras were red, making his green eyes more vibrant than usual.

"Do...do you want me to hug you, or something?"

He didn't respond for a moment. Then he shook his head.

"Okay," she said.

He stood up. "Let's get out of here," he said.

She followed him outside where he started to cry afresh, bitter and lonely and ashamed, and she was hit with a sudden, indescribable fear, a desperate feeling that she couldn't identify. It was a very distressing thing to see and she felt helpless to do anything about it. There didn't seem to be anything she could ostensibly say that would make him stop.

How long had it been since the time she had kissed him, since they had touched? Two months? Two months that could become six months that could become a year that could become ten years that could become the rest of her life. There was nothing pulling them to each other or keeping them together. There was no reason they ever had to see each other ever again. There was no force and there was no obligation. There was nothing.

"Let's get out of here," he said again, gulps of air turning into frenetic hiccups.

"Okay," she said. "Where do you want to go? Do you want to go home?"

"No," he said, wiping his face on his arm. "Let's leave this whole—stupid—country—!" He took a few deep breaths so he wouldn't start crying again.

She looked up, into his hurt and crazy face, and smiled.

He laughed.

"Where do you want to go?"


	24. Venus

_hi guys :) i was going to have this up sooner but i went away for a few days to visit friends with my family and then when we got back it was Thanksgiving and people came to visit us instead! at any rate, last time there was mention of the chapter titles: they are in fact all named for songs. at my lj i posted the song this chapter was named for, Television's "Venus", in case you're curious. if you guys find that interesting i'll post some more of the other songs too. thanks for reading._

**24 Venus**

Adam wiped his eyes and laughed halfheartedly.

"God, don't you hate it when a man cries," he said. "Especially when it's me."

It was an odd sort of day, very un-California, where the clouds seemed to move too quickly, perforated now and then by the sun's bright and unpredictable appearance. Adam drove the car with the top down fast and hard and it was exhilarating and scary enough that she laughed.

"Well, some people think I don't deserve it," she was saying as they stood at a gas station while Adam's car was attended to.

"Why's that, 'cos of Lance?"

"Well, yeah, I mean, he got some flack, but what else were they supposed to do? Blue wouldn't take the title, and besides, Lance is a great trainer."

She thought he was going to say something, but he didn't.

"So some people think my winning is sort of arbitrary," she continued. "Like, Lance was just a gap where there wasn't really a Champion, and now I'm like this sort of rough spot because I beat someone who was Champion on a technicality."

"Well, I think people are upset about that," he said, "but there are people who really are upset that it could be construed that your victory was unfair."

"That makes sense," she said. "But I think some people might have been suspicious because Lance and I are both from Johto. I mean, what are the odds?"

"Pretty good, apparently."

Fuel was much more expensive in Kanto than in Johto, and they were the only people at the station. Adam told her quite breezily that actually there was no such thing as an energy crisis and that it was just a way to raise prices. She didn't know how comforting that was, or how much she believed it.

"Red and Blue were from the same place, too," he said. "Not just the same county but the same town."

"Yeah, but I think people liked that, because it was cute. It's a better story when it's about kids. It made it seem like Red was all determined to defeat his friendly rival and that's the kind of thing people like. It seems intimate, like a book. Lance and I are both from Johto, but we barely knew each other. It was a coincidence. Red and Blue wasn't a coincidence, it was a _story_; Red got into pokémon in large part _because_ of Blue. Or at least that's what we're made to believe."

"Maybe," he said, "but every Champion has won under different circumstances; you can't really compare them to each other..."

The sun shone down on them, making the pavement glisten blinding white. A granbull was barking somewhere.

"You have pretty hair," said Adam.

She wasn't ready for the things that shot through her at that moment, a jolt of pain and her heart broke; her head swimming as she looked at the ground, she wanted to smile and cry at the same time.

"Are you all right?"

She closed her eyes and pressed her lips together; her arms hung pointlessly at her sides like vestigial structures.

"Delilah?"

She felt his hand gingerly on her shoulder and recoiled from it. She opened her eyes and saw his knees.

"What's the matter?"

"I'm—I'm okay..."

A tear spilled down her cheek, escaping through the cracks in her speech. It fell onto the top of her breast and dripped into her cleavage.

He touched her again and she didn't flinch. His hand slid down the length of her arm before swinging away.

She didn't look up; another tear rolled down her face and landed on the ground in a dark spot.

"Adam..."

"What?"

He edged closer to her and brushed her fingers with his.

She sniffed and wiped her nose on the back of her hand. What could she say? She looked at the polka dots she was painting on the sidewalk and wondered if anybody had cried there before her, if she was standing on somebody else's tears.

Adam took another step toward her, but didn't seem to know what to do and hung there for a moment. She wanted to squeeze him and touch him and wrap herself up in him.

"Do you want to talk about something?" he asked her.

Suddenly tired, she took a long breath.

It was released on a sigh.

"Can you please tell me what this is all about," she said.

The granbull started to bark again.

She peeked up at him, and quickly looked back down.

The barking continued for several seconds.

She heard him swallow before speaking.

"I don't know," he said.

He was directly in front of her, close enough that it was awkward that they weren't touching.

She got the impression that he wanted to kiss her, but she was looking at the ground and he didn't.

The granbull carried on barking.

Somebody yelled, "Shut up!"

She laughed, and he did too, clearly relieved.

"So what do you want to do?" he asked when they got back in the car.

"Nothing very serious," she said, wiping her eyes. "I'm exhausted. Let's just do something dumb. Let's do something completely and totally stupid beyond reason."

"Stupid beyond reason?" He laughed. "As opposed to what? Stupid within reason?"

"Well, you know what I mean," she said. "You know, like, Robin Williams or Pippi Longstocking or something will come and, uh, like, skinnydip in a public fountain, and then we wear white to a funeral we weren't invited to, or go to an expensive restaurant and don't pay the bill. And then they leave and it's sad but life is a little more colorful. You know."

"Okay," he agreed. "What do you want to do?"

"I don't know," she said. "What's something you've never done before?"

"I never had measles," he said.

She laughed. "Well, that's 'cuz there's a vaccine. So we can't do that."

"You know, I never broke a bone, either."

"Me neither. But it sounds like a lot of work," she said. "I guess you can go ahead if you want to but I don't think I want to be involved."

"This is awfully depressing," he said. "Do you want to get married?"

She laughed. "Maybe if it were with an Elvis priest."

"I know what we're missing," he said. "A little orphaned pauper ragamuffin who steals to eat and always has fun. Like...sort of...uh, you know, the Artful Dodger, and some Tom Sawyer. He'd know what to do."

"I don't know if orphaned pauper ragamuffins still exist," she said. "And if they do, they're probably not nearly as endearing two hundred years later."

"Yeah, who am I kidding, I hate children..."

They were in Pewter when it started to rain, and he put up the top.

"So what do you want to do?" he asked her once again as they sat in the parked car.

He seemed to want a definite answer. She knew that he was probably really asking what she wanted to do about their relationship but she evasively said "I don't know" and looked out the window. "Do you want to go to the museum?"

"The Science Museum?"

She nodded. His arm went around her shoulders and immediately heat flared in her cheeks and he leaned over and kissed her.

"I'm really a jerk," he said, lingering on her lips.

She kissed him while he was there. "I know," she said. She shivered at his touch, the contraction of her diaphragm pressing her breast into his hand. "I'm kind of a bitch," she said.

He laughed a little, his hand running up to her neck. "I know," he said, his mouth moving against her skin.

She was touching the inside of his leg and she didn't remember when that had happened and she saw his pants move. "Hey, Adam..."

"Hmm."

"Um..."

He looked serious. "What?"

"I'm a virgin?" she blurted out, suddenly embarrassed.

There was a beat as it registered.

Adam seemed to struggle to understand the meaning of this word.

"...Whatever," he finally said, and kissed her again.

"Is it okay?"

He didn't answer her right away. "Well, it makes no difference to _me_," he said, "but...I mean, why? Why are you a virgin?"

"I don't know," she mumbled defensively.

"I mean, I don't say that it's a bad thing," he said quickly. "Are you saving it for marriage?"

She thought this was a strange conclusion to draw considering how much of her body she had allowed him to access. "No," she said. "Is that the only reason a girl can be a virgin?"

"I was just asking," he said, letting his hand drop.

"I just never really wanted to do it that much."

"Why not?" He looked confused.

She shrugged, her face hot.

"I don't mean to embarrass you," he said. "I just..." There was something like guilt on his face.

The rain was loud on the roof. "I don't want to make it a big deal," she said.

"Well, I'm glad you told me, anyway," he said, sitting up straight. "I guess it would be seemly to take advantage of this moment and inform you that I'm not a virgin."

"Really?"

"I understand why you might not be comfortable with my reputation."

"It's no big deal," she said. "Besides, why do it with another virgin? It's going to be awkward enough anyway..."

Half of his mouth smiled, in such a way that she couldn't tell whether or not he was making fun of her.

"I mean, as long as I don't die of syphilis in a French prison," she added.

He laughed, and started the car. "You'll be okay," he said.

In the museum he asked her if she really did want to get married. She laughed, but then she stopped and said, "Wait, seriously?"

"No! Nothing serious," he said. "Just for a laugh, just to upset my parents."

She laughed. "Well, okay, why not?"

He looked surprised. "Well, you don't have to, just 'cos I asked," he said. "You can say no...I mean, I know some girls plan their weddings since they were, like, eight, with all your friends as bridesmaids and grooms, and a cake four feet tall, and a honeymoon in Hawaii, and a dress with a train a mile long."

"No, that's okay," she said. "I just want someone to open pickle jars and kill mosquitoes for me."

He laughed. "Maybe my dad'll get that heart attack I was hoping for."

"What a terrible thing to say," she said. "I always thought he liked me. Do you really think he'd be that upset?"

"He'll spontaneously combust," he said. "We'll know he's heard about it when all the rain turns to steam."

Sometimes Adam exaggerated, but not always.

As soon as they were alone in front of some fossils he pawed at her posterior but she parried the petting.

"I thought you could do that with your fiancée," he said. "Can we touch each other? Am I at least going to be able to look on you naked?" He was smiling but she wasn't sure how much of it was teasing.

"I was just..." She didn't know what she was just.

There was a kind of awkward quiet during which they both seemed to feel like they had done something mean and then Adam said, "I guess you're right. You _know_ how people are jealous."

She laughed, which apparently had been his goal.

"But there's nothing modest about me," he said. "I'm too rich, and too beautiful, and too superior. There isn't a calling for modesty."

"What a face you've got," said Delilah. "But you're a nasty thing. A _nasty_ thing."

"Well, you can have affairs, if you want," he said.

"That's...sweet...I guess."

"I'll probably be horrid and jealous but it's only fair."

"I guess you can have affairs too," she said.

He laughed, and it flustered her, because she didn't know what it meant.

"And what is that supposed to mean?" she asked, unable to read his weird signals.

"Nothing." He shrugged. "Don't let's fight, please, Delilah, I'm sorry."

"I'm not fighting," she mumbled.

"I wasn't laughing at you," he said.

She knew he was looking at her, waiting for her to look back at him so he could make sure she believed him, but she was embarrassed and wouldn't. He tentatively put his arm around her in a sort of sideways hug and she felt suddenly very immature.

"I'm sorry," he said again. "Don't be upset..."

She was sorry too, and felt sick and ashamed that he was apologizing to her. She leaned into him, too embarrassed to speak.

For a moment she stayed there, feeling him feeling her, taking in the citrus chypre he was wearing and thinking, perhaps inappropriately, that olfactory input was sent directly to the amygdalae.

"I'm not upset," she clarified. His clavicle was like a sheer cliffside against her eyebrow.

"I wouldn't blame you if you were," he said. "I've done some pretty bad things to you."

She could feel his penis, half-erect against her pelvis—was that a stupid thing to notice? "Well, I've said even worse to you," she said.

"Like my father says," he said, letting go of her: "you get what you pay for."

She smiled skeptically. "Is that what he says?"

"Well." He shrugged. "Addendum: unless you cheat."

"Is there a Team Rocket motto?" she asked. "When I was, like, ten, somebody told me that the Team Rocket motto is 'all pokémon exist for the glory of Team Rocket', or something like that."

"That's catchy, isn't it?" he said, laughing. "Nice and subtle. What my dad says all the time is: tutto è fuomo e vento, fuorché l'oro e l'argento. Except for gold and silver, everything is but smoke and wind." He paused. "It's prettier in Italian," he said.

"I guess a lot of things probably are," she said.

Getting married wasn't something Delilah expected would actually happen. She thought it was going to be like someone saying, "Wouldn't it be great to live on a boat, and just sail around in the Pacific? Living on a boat would be so awesome, and we could put up lights at Christmas?" Then the other person would say, "Yeah, man, that would be great! If I get a job this summer and save money we could totally get that shit done by the end of this year." And then nothing would happen. Maybe it would become an inside joke, or they would revisit the fantasy once every now and then, but neither person ever had any intention of following through.

They spent a long time touching each other in the car and Adam said something stupid and dirty that made her laugh. "I read something about you once," she said, "about a year ago I guess. It was something very scathing, something like, 'please remind me why Adam Harlow is considered so attractive, he looks like he sweats five flavors of gonorrhea'."

Adam smiled, feeling the curves of her hips and waist, and she was hit suddenly with how surreal it was that people on the internet called her a bitch, as if she wouldn't find out, when in fact there was nothing to stop her confronting them.

"I just remember thinking," she said, "what would it be like...to be insulted, so casually. And I guess I found out..."

"I'm not a person," said Adam. "I'm vocabulary."

She laughed again. He laughed too but not very much.

"You surprise me," he said. "You're not familiar with celebrity. You don't understand how people look at you, and what they see."

She frowned. "No," she said. "I guess I don't."

"You're a symbol, Delilah," he said. "You're a first, you're a synonym, you're property, a product for consumption. You connote something to a lot of people, something besides who you are. You're not real anymore."

But Adam had lived his entire life having his every whim and fancy promptly catered to. No outlandish request inconvenienced those who could afford it. Adam had been born with a multitude of advantages and conveniences so that he had no idea how much they meant to other people. Adam didn't have to work for luxury, he didn't even have to wish for it—luxury simply was the way of things, for Adam.

"I see it when you're in magazines and on television," he said. "Questions don't surprise you anymore because you've been asked before and you've already got an answer. Over time, it's less...flawed, less recognizably human."

"Uh-huh," she said, her shapeliness yielding easily to the harder contours of his body.

"People feel entitled to you. Maybe they are," he said, his hand slithering up her dress. "But they certainly feel that way..."

They talked to the vicar, or whatever, who had baptized Adam, and they signed an affidavit which was a paper saying who they were and that they hadn't been married before and that Delilah wasn't a member of the Anglican Church.

The next day she let Adam into her room and he saw a bag of Eggward's food pellets and a few pairs of Delilah's shoes. "Why do you still have your things out?" he asked her. "Why didn't you pack up?"

"I don't know," she said. "I didn't know..."

It was true but she knew it sounded stupid.

That was sort of refreshing about Adam. If he said he was going to do something, he always did it. Most people weren't like that, especially grown-ups.

"I'm not mad at you," he insisted when she got quiet.

It seemed like he was really trying to assure her a lot that he didn't want to fight with her. She didn't really know what to make of it.

"So, how do you dream about losing your virginity? 'Cos I'm rich, so, all your dreams can come true."

"I don't dream about losing my virginity..."

"No...? I thought girls dreamt about losing their virginity. You know, strawberries, candles, and champagne, and satin sheets. Rose petals! That's what girls like isn't it."

"Well...if that's what you're into," she said. "I mean, it sounds a little embarrassing, to me...I would probably laugh at you..."

"I should hope you would, because I always thought satin bedclothes sounded like a broken ankle and two months of bad dreams."

"To be perfectly frank, Adam, I don't know if I believe that you've never deflowered a girl before."

"I'm just not a sentimental," he explained. "I won't spontaneously think of romantic things like...rose-scented, chocolate-dipped...heart-shaped...diamonds. So if there's anything special that you want, you'll have to tell me yourself. Because like I said, I can probably get you anything you want."

"That's okay," she said. "I would rather it wasn't a big deal."

"Although, if you tell me you want to 'snuggle', I'll probably kill myself."

She laughed. "With _you_? That'd be like snuggling with a pile of broken glass."

"Well you don't have to be nasty."

In the lobby of a hotel that was nicer than the one where she had been staying, she noticed he was looking at her. The rain had turned her dress see-through. The clerk smirked at them a little until Adam snotted majestically at him that "you only work in a hotel, you know".

"And so what's next on the agenda?" asked Adam as he dried his cocky red hair that was dark and wet. "High romance, breathless passion?"

"Oh, right," said Delilah, who was finishing checking on her pokémon. "The mushy stuff."

"Mushy, oh, God, I hope not, do you know that is my greatest fear."

Delilah thought that was a bit silly but she decided not to say so.

Adam's penis was quite a lot different from Delilah's fingers. There was a slow, smooth stroke and the shocking stretch of elastic and the clean Dior smell of him. They lay there listening to cars driving over wet streets as the sky darkened. Everything suddenly seemed very inane and funny, and the overwhelming meaninglessness gave her a feeling of immense giddy unburdening.

How stupid!


	25. Roadrunner

_hi guys! This took forever mainly because the term at school is just ending and I've had finals and suchlike. I think I must have uploaded the last chapter on autopilot and then just forgot about this story completely, LOL! I didn't think about it at all! So thank you freeziepop for the reminder! It sure was a shock to my system to get a review alert in my e-mail haha._

_freeziepop also says, "I guess two people can be so completely wrong for each other that they somehow work", and I wonder...is there anybody on EARTH who would actually be "right" for either Adam or Delilah? ;) (afterwards staple this to your scantron which must be in no 2 pencil!)_

_thanks for reading!  
_

**25 Roadrunner**

What kind of people got married that young, anyway? Low-class heathen, who tried to sue each other for assault and got verbal lashings from Judge Judy.

"I'm not that young," said Adam. "Jessica Simpson was younger than I am when she and Nick Lachey got married."

"They're divorced."

"And a Jonas Brother recently got married."

"I don't think anybody is going to mistake you for a Jonas Brother."

"And then there's Harry Potter," he continued. "Harry Potter must have been quite young really when he married Ginny."

"Harry Potter...?"

"You read _Harry Potter_, didn't you?"

"Well, sure, but...can you really make the comparison."

"I don't see why not," he said. "_Harry Potter_ is bursting with good role models..."

He kissed her in the bathroom and she said, "Ouch."

"Is my face scratchy?" asked Adam, feeling his jaw.

"Yeah, but it's okay," she said. "It's a natural exfoliant, for radiant skin, you know?" He laughed toothpaste in her eyes.

He kissed her again and uttered romantically, "Come on, I'm great in the morning."

"Be still, my beating heart," she said, but he was right. Adam could access her orgasmic response better than she ever could, and when she thought about that it was sort of gross, but life went on as it always had. The world didn't stop because of the undignified slap of flesh.

Delilah had never had a boyfriend before or even been on a real date, so she had no idea what Adam was expecting from her. She told him that she had never cleaned a toilet or cooked anything of higher investment than toast, and he told her that he had never shot an animal or operated a lawnmower.

"You're rich now, Delilah," he said as his cell phone rang on the nightstand. "You can pay other people to do everything dull."

She meditated on this as he looked at his phone.

"Guess who it is," he said. "I'd hoped he'd died of shock. I wonder how he found out."

That was a joke, or something: Adam had gotten a couple of dewy new Rocket grunts to be witnesses. Of course his father would have heard about it.

"Why shouldn't it have been a religious ceremony?" Adam asked his father. "I'm C of E, and that's your doing. Delilah's not a citizen, so of course it was common licence."

He was so smug she wanted to hit him. Instead she got up and started to get dressed.

Among many other undesirable characteristics, Adam had a bit of a temper. After not very long he hung up on his father and sighed. Then he came over and leaned on the bathroom doorframe. His hair was glossy and soft and it hung in front of his face.

"What are you doing today?" he asked her.

"Publicity photos," she said. "I told you yesterday."

"So you did," he said.

After a pause she asked, "So do you think you're misunderstood?"

"What?"

"Misunderstood," she repeated. "I feel like a lot of people are going to say, 'You married Adam Harlow, that famous big jerk? Is he just misunderstood? Is he nice when you get to know him?' And I'm going to have to say, 'Well, not really...'"

He laughed, and came into the bathroom to contemplate his reflection. "There are some individuals whose understanding I would find humbling and rather offensive."

She laughed.

"Enemies," he said. "They're a comfort, aren't they?"

His face looked pale and stark in the wan light of the overcast morning.

"Disapproval," he said, "may be the price of autonomy. It only depends on market value."

She was seized with a tremendous sadness that brazen, unblushing Adam could speak so bleakly.

As she was eating breakfast he dropped a magazine on the table. "Picture of you," he said.

She pulled it closer to have a look as he sat down. It was her in her turquoise Manolo Blahniks standing with Lance and a made-up story about how they were trying to have a baby. "Why do they even bother?" she wondered.

"Obviously people like it," he said indifferently. "Somebody got paid to write it."

She wondered if maybe she was being insensitive, considering the kinds of horrible things people said about Adam all the time. But she thought those were quite a lot easier to believe. Indeed the better she got to know Adam the more she thought the tabloids would never truly do him justice, that no amount of snappy puns and gratuitous bolding could ever quite live up to his unique brand of crazy.

They both fell quiet, trying to listen to the hushed conversation behind them.

"Ask her for her autograph," a woman whispered.

The girl started to whine, "But I don't want..."

"Go ask her, don't be silly, go on."

A little girl appeared next to Delilah. "Can I have your autograph?" she asked.

"Sure," said Delilah. "What would you like me to sign?"

"Oh, God—" The mother showed up, looking flustered, and handed Delilah a page she ripped from a leather agenda. "Here, sorry about..."

"No problem," said Delilah, looking through her purse until Adam handed her a pen. The woman obviously recognized him and gave him a polite but very strained smile; Adam raised his eyebrows like Draco Malfoy or something, and she averted her gaze. The daughter looked very bored. "And who is it for?" asked Delilah.

"Jen," said the woman quickly, putting her hand on the girl's head. "You're such a fan, aren't you?"

The girl didn't say anything.

In the car Adam complained, "Nobody ever asks for _my_ autograph."

"Aww, why not?"

"It's not easy to be a despicable cur," he sighed. "People don't like you."

Adam probably was more famous than Delilah, who was mostly well-known within the sphere of her job. Adam's celebrity was a bit more mainstream.

For her entertainment he reenacted the time he shot an editorial at this particular studio: "Are hyou ze stupidest model in ze vorld? Vaht are hyou sinking? It vas shit! Vaht do hyou do in ze dressing room for all zees hours, masturbate and sink of ze vays hyou can vaste anozer chunk of my life?" He paused. "Well, that was true, that was. So all I could do was yell and stomp about. As it turned out, he liked the passion."

She laughed. "Typical..."

Modeling, Delilah was learning, was about posing in a way that maximized a person's looks and charisma, and conveyed the art director's intentions. That was why Adam's photos were always so visually striking—he could manipulate his face and body to make the most of his arresting attractiveness.

She hurried into the dressing room for five minutes to change between sets, stopping for just a moment to pet Farley, who was curled up on her clothes. She stepped out of the dress she was wearing and adjusted her rather serious underpinnings. She reached for the photo schedule to see what she had to put on next when she heard the snap of a suspender being unclipped by stress; as she fixed it her Pokégear beeped horribly, and when she reached for _that_ an earring fell out.

It was a text message from Adam. She opened it, wondering what he could possibly want.

_i just put on your eyeliner and it looks good_

"Are you _kidding_ me," she said out loud, throwing it unceremoniously back into her bag and crouching down to look for the earring.

It was a different sort of modeling from Adam's. Delilah did celebrity pictures. Delilah did glamour; Adam did fashion. Delilah's pictures weren't art. They were marketing. People went out of their way to accommodate her on shoots; Adam said models were miserable from rejection and from being spoken to like seven-year-olds, that the only respect afforded them on set was for their skin—"so at least when you get slapped in the face it's with Crème de la Mer," he said.

When she got home she was tired and kind of aggravated but she had to immediately start getting ready to go to a benefit event for an animal charity, only to hear the infernal ring of her Pokégear as she was getting dressed.

"Pokémon League Saffron Offices, calling for Miss Delilah Peerenboom. Miss Peerenboom, will you hold for Mr Driscoll?"

"Yes, of course," she said, trying not to sigh. The League season was starting soon and she was busier than ever.

"Delilah?" said Mr Driscoll's crisp voice. "I know you're busy, Delilah, so I'll get right to it—we've had a thought here, and wanted to know how you'd like to battle Blaine Augustine, of the Cinnabar Gym."

"Oh, sure!" she said, very glad it wasn't another social function where everybody meets people they already know and pretends to have fun to raise money. "That sounds fun, I always liked him."

"Good! We'll sit down with him and arrange a date, then."

"Oh, by the way..."

"Yes?"

"I should probably tell you...that I...got married...?"

"You what?"

"I got married. I just thought you'd want to know."

"To whom?" He sounded extremely confused.

"Adam Harlow."

"What?"

"Adam Harlow. I married Adam Harlow, the other day."

"Wh—I didn't even know you were dating," he said, bewildered.

"We're not..."

"I—well—are you pregnant?"

"No."

"All right, well I suppose it's your business, skipping off to Gretna Green or what-have-you," he said, regaining his capable and professional tone.

"I hope I didn't just create some kind of PR disaster..."

He laughed slightly shakily. "Not to worry, just gave us a bit of a shock for a minute. You could sail to Cinnabar, you know, the _Aqua_ is going through Cinnabar and the Seafoam and Sevii Islands in June. If you'd like a honeymoon."

"Oh, yeah, the cruise ship," she said. "I'm allowed a guest, right?"

"Of course," said Mr Driscoll. "I was surprised you didn't bring one last time."

She suddenly felt kind of inept. Of course she was allowed to bring a guest. Who went on a transatlantic cruise alone? Well, she did...and she'd had fun too...

In the bathroom she asked Adam, "So how long do you want to be married?"

"How long do I want to be married?" he repeated slowly, applying a layer of shaving oil. "That's a difficult question to answer, isn't it?"

She was busy with her make-up so her response was just a monotonous, "Uh-huh..."

"Well...I'm contrary by nature...so I at least want to be married...as long as people think we're heading for divorce," he said, distracted by his shaving rituals.

"Uh-huh..."

"But if you ever want a divorce...of course you need only tell me...but it's only marriage...it's not like it matters...it doesn't mean anything..."

She smiled on a surge of sudden fondness for him, and she went to the benefit with that image of him in her head, shaving his face with a cigarette in his mouth. She knew that they probably expected her speech to be the spoken equivalent of the horrible pamphlets activists handed out on the street with pictures of miltanks shoved in crates to make them tender, and stories about how McDonald's ground up fluffy baby torchics to make Chicken McNuggets, and the vast overuse of words like "vivisection". So naturally it was an immense disappointment, as measured by the unbelievable laughter she got for a lame throwaway joke about her bringing Adam because she loved animals.

"I'm glad you're Champion," a woman told her afterward as everyone pretended to like each other for charity. "You're such a good speaker, and you're so pretty."

"Well, everyone needs a hobby," said Delilah.

She laughed. "I do mean it, though, you've got beautiful hair."

Adam broke in to wreak social carnage by saying, "I think you've got nice hair, it's a very pretty colour."

The woman grimaced and patted her hair self-consciously. "Oh, it's awful," she said, "it's all greasy today."

Adam lifted an eyebrow. "_Darling_," he said, all chilling sarcasm, "do you try to tell me you've got better taste than _mine_?"

She looked taken aback. "What?"

Adam drew himself up haughty and beautiful like a flamenco dancer. "I have a vasty education in looking good," he sneered. "I do think I know what I'm talking about."

Shortly they both walked away in a huff. Clearly Adam had never been so insulted and the woman seemed to feel the same way.

"So much for healthy self-esteem or press respect after this," Delilah said to nobody but her wine glass and her career.


	26. Silver

**26 Silver**

When Delilah was by herself, odds were pretty high that a man would say something dumb like "hello beautiful" or "how are you doing gorgeous" as they passed each other. She didn't mind, exactly, but she didn't really understand the point of it. Why bother saying something to her in those bare seconds as they passed? It didn't accomplish anything. Where did they expect it to go?

And the worst part was having to figure out what to say in response. For some reason they always said it at the worst, most awkward moment, so that if she wanted to respond she would have to turn around completely because by the time he finished saying it she was already behind him, but if she didn't respond they weren't far enough away that it didn't look rude.

She usually didn't respond.

The level of masculine friendliness went down a bit if she was with, for example, Whitney, or another girl. But with Adam, men did not look at her at all. Adam was scary and mean, so maybe they were justified, but he didn't care who looked at him or how. Adam spent as much time in the bathroom as she did, which was really pretty impressive. Delilah had never seen Adam get a smart comment like "hey, the circus is in town" even when he was in full spiked and hairsprayed regalia (maybe because his Cuban-heeled Jeffery-West Beatle boots had ridiculous but ominous skull buttons, or because they brought him to a ridiculous but ominous six and a half feet tall).

After he blighted the lives of two teenage boys asking for a picture with her by informing them of their recent nuptials, Delilah began to wonder how long it would be before there were pictures of her exhaling wrong with big probing arrows pointed at her stomach accompanied by question marks and the gaping primal cries of "BABY BUMP?" "BABY BUMP?" "BABY BUMP?"

She also wondered how long it would be before people would stop smiling condescendingly and saying, "You'll change your mind when you're older." Nobody ever said things like that to Adam. Was that just because he was a man?

After one very long day involving her appearance at a garden party followed by a boringly official meeting followed by showing at a Lance Siegfried match followed by arriving late to the League President's birthday party followed by being seen by the Right People at an art show followed by a prompt loss of consciousness, she woke up to the comfortable and slightly nostalgic feeling of being indoors while rain fell outside.

Adam read out loud to her from a tabloid, looking sort of Barbara-Stanwyck-y in his dressing gown and having toast and Dom Pérignon:

_ There's a price tag on his kisses—was trouble ever so cheap?_

_ Word has it that dishy Pokémon Champ Delilah Peerenboom, 19, has managed to tame pure-as-the-driven-slush Adam Harlow, 22, alleged criminal royalty and the proverbial "good time" that was had by all..._

At this point Delilah said, "Ouch!" and started to laugh.

"It must be nice to be married to someone as wonderful as I am," he said.

"It's okay."

"I'm not sure about your taming me," he said. "Maybe I made you wild?"

She said in a Barry White voice, "Boy, you don't know how wild you make me..."

He laughed. "You know, Delilah, you make me think maybe I'm not crazy after all..."

People had occasionally asked Delilah in a confidential stage whisper if she wasn't worried that Adam would cheat on her. She found herself largely unbothered by the prospect. As long as he didn't get Chlamydia or anything it wasn't really any of her business. What bothered her was that nobody seemed even to consider it a possibility that she might cheat on him.

Adam left early to go wear expensive clothes in front of a camera (but get paid for it) and Delilah, excitingly, lazed around the hotel room, until her Pokégear rang, showing a number it didn't recognize.

"Hello?" she asked.

"Good morning, Delilah, it's your new father-in-law."

"Oh," she said with a feeling like a deflating balloon. "Hi."

Giovanni had only ever been nice to her but suddenly her heart was pounding, possibly because she had no idea where he got the number of her Pokégear. She hadn't spoken to him since marrying into his family; he had attempted more than once to speak to Adam again, but Adam always ended up getting mad and at some point stopped answering if it was him or his mother.

"Um...did you want to talk to Adam?" she asked.

"Oh, please," said Giovanni. "It's much too close to dinner."

It was two o'clock.

"I wondered if you and your husband might join me and his mother for dinner, or cocktails, sometime." He had a weird sarcastic edge to his voice, like a social riddle she couldn't decipher.

"Um, well, okay, thank you," she said. "I mean, he's not with me right now, he's shooting, but I'll tell him when he gets back, and we can figure it out..."

When she told him he took it with unexpected maturity, only breaking one plate, which he told the waiter to charge to his father (eating out with Adam, one could not afford to be shy).

The day they agreed to meet his parents for lunch was another fairly busy one; in the morning she presented an award at a ceremony to Brock Harrison for his contributions to the field, allowed her picture to be taken for a while afterward, and then hurried to change so she and Adam could meet them in time.

Ivy complimented her dress and said, "What a lovely girl you are. What on earth did Adam do to deserve you?"

Delilah laughed, somewhat uncomfortably. "Well, he has his moments," she said (generously).

"Or perhaps the question should be: what on earth did _you_ do to deserve _Adam_?"

Adam still was not amused by these sorts of remarks, even though his mother was better-natured about them than his father, whom he refused to look directly in the face.

Delilah had expected perhaps some ground rules or warnings or something about Team Rocket, but of course nothing was so simple and Giovanni just gave her significant appraising looks and made weird comments about how many people in the world died because they didn't have money for healthcare or something. Adam said, "Poor, unfortunate souls," devoid of any emotion.

"Aren't you glad you're not poor or unfortunate?" Giovanni asked, with what he probably thought was fatherly tenderness.

"Yes," Adam replied flatly. "I'm just miserable."

So instead of getting clear answers to unasked questions, Delilah just got a couple of hours of delicate eyebrow arching and meaningful glances. She knew these signals were being sent, and she knew she was supposed to be able to read them, which made her feel very dumb because she didn't understand them.

They were both relieved to get back in the car. "GOD, I can't stand them!" said Adam, gripping the steering wheel like he was giving it an Indian burn. "I'm so glad you didn't take him up on all that."

"On all what?" she asked, feeling incompetent.

"All, you know, knowing looks, and sidelong staring. You just ignored it, it was hilarious."

They fell quiet. Adam reached for her hand, stroking it once with his finger. He smiled, a little sad, and it made her feel sad.

Going on a cruise with Adam was quite a different experience from going by herself. Wherever they went on the ship, they always seemed to find somebody he knew, in a restaurant, or poolside, or on the battle court. The first couple of times it happened, Delilah didn't think much of it, but then she realized it was because the ship was full of wealthy people over forty. The two of them were certainly among the youngest on board—probably the youngest people there without parents.

Most of the other travelers seemed put out by all the rain, but Delilah didn't see how they could be upset when there were so many interesting things to see on the ship. Besides all the nice restaurants there was a library, a theatre, a battle court, and absolutely the most first-rate combination eavesdropping/people-watching that Delilah had ever experienced. There was also, of course, her suite, which had a staircase, a balcony, and three toilets for no good reason.

When not attending cocktail parties full of people three times her age, Delilah spent most of her time with the large amount of unanswered fan mail she had brought along. Adam had tennis dates with his fellow jaded wealthy persons, made slushies with Veuve Clicquot, and told baristas to shut up when they lectured him about the environmental hazards of cardboard cup holders. So the only difference, really, was that she didn't have to pay for anything; otherwise it was business as usual, social obligations in the form of autographed publicity stills and champagne hangovers.

The sky was only clear on the first day; when they got back to the room it was very late, and the light of the moon through the green curtains cast everything into opalescence.

"When I was in second grade," she said as he wrestled with her clothes, "my friend asked me, 'Are you going to have sex when you grow up?' And I was like, 'Ew, _no_!' And she said, 'Me neither. Besides, I _doubt_ men would want to feel squishy women's boobs.'"

He burst out laughing. "Well, I think you know what _my_ favourite part of you is," he said, filling his hands with her breasts, his breath down her neck like something alive.

"Tell me."

"Your brains."

She laughed. "Well, the brain _is_ supposed to be the largest sexual organ...and whatever's in my head can't be very big..."

He kissed her instead of replying. Sometimes it was nice to be married to Adam, mostly when he kissed her.

"You know," she said breathlessly, "your immune system is why you have chemistry with some people."

He laughed. "Yeah, nerdy talk me, all that vulgar nonsense," he said, moving his pelvis back and forth.

"It's the densest area of the genome, the major histocompatibility complex."

"Mmmnh," he said, squeezing his eyes shut.

"In people it's called the human leukocyte antigen," she said, running her hand over his head so his whole body shuddered, his lip twisting reflexively.

There was nobody else like Adam in the whole world. There had been and would be billions upon billions of people in the world and more, but Adam's life would never repeat. Nobody would ever have the same parents and the same name at the same time in the same place.

She watched the smoke fall out of his mouth as the sun bruised the sky gray and gold. "How much do you smoke?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Why?"

She shrugged. He looked at her, and put his arm around her neck.

"I'm a mess," he said against her ear.

"You're a very hot mess," she elaborated for him.

She felt Gauloises smoke skim over the side of her face as he laughed, and then he kissed her.

"I'll get cancer from kissing you," she said, but she let him do it again. Delilah had never much cared for the smell of cigarettes. It smelled dirty, it smelled poor. But she didn't mind it so much, with Adam's chic colognes.

When she woke up in the morning he was ordering grapefruit juice from room service. He hung up the telephone, accidentally knocking it to the floor with a clatter. "Shit," he said, picking it up and replacing it.

It sounded like he either put on or removed an item of clothing, and then seemed to mill around for several minutes. She woke up again when she felt his weight on the bed, and he picked up the telephone again. He dialed a number, waited, and then hung up, muttering indistinctly.

He picked something up off the floor, and crumpled it up. "Delilah?" he said. "Delilah? Are you—are you going to wake up?"

She rolled over to face him, sighing. "I've been awake, a little while," she said.

He smiled. "I've been mucking about for a while," he said. "By myself."

She wiped sleep out of her eye, and saw that he was holding something. "Is that—oh, it's an envelope."

He handed it to her. It was a fan letter she had left on the floor. "Nice day," he said, looking toward the balcony, where it was storming. "Shall we—is Mr Goodshow coming...?"

"Did we talk to him last night, I can't remember."

"I think it...seems to me I spoke to him—"

"Could call him," she suggested, sitting up.

"Well, he wouldn't be there now," said Adam, watching her put on a robe. "Too early."

"Have you been eating all the time?" she asked, looking at the food he had ordered. "I see all this food. Have you been eating without me?"

"Do you know what I miss about Johto?" he said, looking at the food.

"What?"

"Mexican Cokes. You can get them so easy there."

"Yeah, they are nice."

"A painkiller and a Mexican Coke," he said. "Breakfast of the saints."

The telephone rang, but Adam just looked at it, even though he was sitting about a foot from it. "Do you want to get it?" she prompted him.

It rang again.

"It's a wrong number, if you don't like the person, just say it's a wrong number."

He picked it up. "Hello?" he said. "Yes. Um...who...? Oh, hi! How are you...yes, I do. With Delilah. That was lovely, nobody said a word...you don't like the place? Well, not that time. Every time I go there it gets worse..."

Delilah got up and went into the bathroom. "What's—?"

"That would be lovely...no. No. That would be brilliant..."

"Adam?"

"Umm, not sure. I...imagine I will be there. Oops—there's people trying—um..."

"Adam!"

He mouthed "wait" and then looked surprised and said, "Oh my God...good Lord, that's fantastic...right now...? There, I have to go and shoot some—a few shoots...hmm, I don't know what time would...do you know where you'll be, maybe I could call you. At this—at what number...? Okay. Then...I will. Oh...two hours? Okay. Yeah, I'm sure. I'm sure of it. I will do. Yeah. It's my room. I'll call him."

As he hung up Delilah asked, "Where is my toothbrush?"

"Oh, I let the maid clean the toilet with it. That was the person from the other night."

"What does he want?"

"He wants to see me."

She found her toothbrush where he had moved it. "What's so great, on Thursday night?"

"On—? Oh! Something about some party. I think I've forgotten it already. I'm going to—the eighteenth—the eighteenth's tomorrow!"

"The eighteenth is tomorrow," she agreed.

"Oh...Monday, then. No..."

"What did he say, did he say, 'I want your picture on my magazine, ciao ciao ciao'?"

"No, no, he...said there was...well, I don't know, honestly, I can't remember! I just spoke to him..." She started to comb her hair and he said, "My dad didn't give me any money this month."

"He's probably trying to get you to talk to him."

"Yeah, I figure." A sigh hit her neck. "What shall I do?"

"Well...you can...you can rob a bank," she suggested. "You can marry somebody rich..."

He went back and sat down, his long white body bending like a ribbon. "Yeah, except most of the people I know...I know a lot of rich people, but they're all gits. You know, they're just...so you can't stand to be around them."

"Well..."

"You know, like, I'd like to kill my grandmother," he said, worryingly tearing a bit off a piece of toast. "Just...do away with her. She's a useless thing." She laughed. "Once while we were staying in Nice with her, my father let her call me a femminuccia but then he yelled at me when I called her a drunken old hag. So I took her ninetales fur coat and turned it inside-out and slept in it naked."

She laughed. "Did she ever find out?"

"I don't think so...but how about this thing tonight...?"

"We could skip the whole thing and just go to the movies," said Delilah, sitting down. "And then we can just go to the dinner any time we want."

"Well, you sort of have to be there."

"I don't remember what it was for, what was the dinner all about?"

"Nothing, really, but you're the guest of honour."

"Oh..."

"Well, it's people like Edward and Corey...do you think that sounds bad?"

"As long as we don't have to talk to them it's all right."

"Well, Edward'll do all the talking."

She opened the letter she had left on the bed. When she laughed, Adam asked her what it said. "You just gird your blue-veined loins, girl," she told him.

Most of Delilah's letters from fans were fairly generic, along the lines of, "Dear Miss Peerenboom, Hi my name is Daniel and I'm a big fan! Can you send me a photo? Here's one of me. By the way I think you looked really sexy on your interview with Professor Oak! (I saw it on television.) Love, Daniel." However, this individual had written her an angry tirade about recent pictures and rumors in which he referred to Adam as a "skinny Vicodin fagitt". "Somebody's got my number," said Adam when she read it to him.

She thought this slur was neutered slightly by the first fact that it misspelled like Ron Weasley's broken wand and by the second fact that Adam had probably slept with more women than most men wished they could.

"I am on the skinny side," he observed, turning sideways in front of his reflection.

"Funny, 'cuz everyone knows you don't take a Vicodin without eating."

"I mean, Vicodin's a precautionary measure," said Adam. "You know, what if I stub my toe later? It's like a contraceptive."

"Well, two out of three, not bad," she said, folding up the letter. "Unless you are gay, but that's none of my business really."

"Do I come off a bit poofy?" he asked, doing a Janice Dickinson in the mirror.

"Well, if you do, it's probably more of an insult to me, considering you slept with me."

"Yeah, but you slept with me right back."

"What was the question again?"

"I'm handsome, not smart."

Maybe Delilah would hold her Champion title for several years, maybe even to her death, or maybe she would lose it at the end of the summer.

Maybe she and Adam would end up having a long and messy divorce when they remembered how much they hated each other, or maybe their careless marriage would last precisely because they didn't care about it.

Maybe she would be stabbed in the neck by a mentally unstable "fan" who waited hours in the rain to buy a VIP ticket to one of her matches and then killed himself.

Maybe she was being closely monitored by Team Rocket, and maybe one day she would care.

In the end, things would only go one way; but in the meantime, you just never know, do you...?

THE END

_Hey guys once again I'm sorry this took so long, I don't really have an excuse for my complacency. I have this thing where, once I finish something in my head, I don't feel like actually finishing it "in real life" because hey, I already KNOW how it's going to end, so what's the fun in that? So that's not really fair to you guys. Pretty dumb huh? The smart thing would be to lag updates during the exciting part of the story where people are eager to see what happens next, not during the boring resolution lol ;)_

_ Anyway yeah so that's it, I hope you've enjoyed reading this strange thing. Seriously, I can't even imagine what it must be like to read this. I keep wanting to make some scathing mathematical witticism—you know, something like "_The Princess Diaries_ times Anne Rice equals _Twilight_"—but the thing is, I can't think of anything similar enough that I could make that sort of comparison. But then, I don't even read very much. So whatevs, I guess I'll have to give up on that._

_ Anyway...I'll still make a couple more posts at my LJ if you're interested, like I STILL have not written out all the songs the chapters are named for. So I'm definitely going to do that, and maybe make a couple more posts about random things that may occur to me._

_ I don't write very much, but when I do, it's basically a way for me to think about my thoughts (how meta!)...I don't write more than one story at a time, so what comes out ends up being a sort of map of my mind at that time, a way for me to organize whatever ridiculous philosophical pensées may be floating around getting overanalyzed. So thanks one more time to everyone who has reviewed the story or added it to their favorites or put it on alert. And if you read silently, thank you too for sharing this with me. :)  
_


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